Saved by a Song
by Wraithdarte
Summary: Cas has a half Human sister who suffers from severe PTSD. She has become a danger to herself, and to the mundane humans she tries to protect. He asks the Winchesters to help her.
1. Chapter 1

**For Maggie, for Bethie, and especially JazMich.**

**Much thanks, my beautiful, bitchin' Beta. **

**Te Amo, Babe. Always. ;) **

Chapter One.

Cas appeared as silently as ever in the boys' motel room. It took Sam a minute to notice that he was there, and Dean was out on a beer run. When the shaggy head did lift from the old tome he was perusing, a slight widening of his eyes was the only sign of his surprise. "Hey, Cas. What's up?"

The angel caught himself as he started to look up towards the ceiling. That was something he still had a hard time getting used to, even after almost six years, and several months of humanity. "I need a favor. Where is Dean?" He asked, looking around, as if to see his friend hiding in a corner.  
"He's out grabbing supplies." Sam closed his book, regarding the angel in front of him with curious eyes. "Anything I can help with?"

"Well, yes, I hope so. The favor I need will most definitely require both of you."

Sam's brow furrowed in concern. "What's wrong?"  
Cas sighed, and sat on the edge of one of the beds. Sam leaned forward in his chair, worry bowing his shoulders towards his friend.

"It...is a long story. A very complicated story. It would be easiest to tell it once."

"Okay. Dean should be back soon. He's been gone awhile. D'you want me to call him, see where he is?"

Cas nodded. "I would appreciate it, yes, please?"

Sam's phone was at his ear and ringing when the knob turned and the door opened. "What?" Dean demanded. "Hey Cas," he tossed over his shoulder as an aside. He plunked the pair of six packs on the table. "What was so important you needed to call me as I was walking _in the door_?"

Sam's eyebrows raised, he pointed over his brother's shoulder. "May I point out the angel in the room?"

"What? What angel? Those douchebags popping in again? I thought they couldn't find us." Dean turned to gaze around the room. When his eyes fell on the trenchcoat-clad Cas on his bed, Dean did a double take. "When'd you get here?"

"He's been here for about five minutes. You said _**hello**_ to him, dumbass."

"You're-nevermind. Hey, Cas."  
"Hello, Dean."

"What's up?"

Sam stood and moved his chair closer to the beds. "Cas has a job for us."  
"Yeah? What?" Dean moved over to sit on Sam's bed.

"I take it you aren't in the middle of anything pressing?"  
"No, we just finished up a case. Ganked a revenant. Good times."  
"Ah." Cas nodded heavily. "That is good to hear."

"Cas-you're stalling." Sam pressed. "What's wrong? What do you need our help with?"  
"...my sister."

…..

"You're _**WHAT?**_" Dean demanded hotly. "Tell me I misheard that!"

"She's not..._really_ my sister. I just don't really know the term for it."

"How about you start from the beginning?" Sam suggested, ever the tactful one. During interrogations, at least.

"Do you know how angels are made?" Cas asked.

"No." Dean said expletively, the "DUH!" heavily implied.

"We are made when our parent angel splits a part of their grace away from themselves, and holds it within himself until that split piece of grace becomes strong enough to be sentient, and to think for itself."  
"Because the average angel can do that." Dean deadpanned under his breath.

"Dean!" Sam admonished, then gestured for Cas to continue.

"Well, sometimes, we shed parts of our grace. Little parts. Like the way your skin cells shed when you touch anything. Little flecks brush off when we spread our wings, and when we teleport. These are basically harmless, and if they come in contact with humans, they may feel a pressing need to go to one of your churches, or something of that nature, but my parent angel, Zadkiel, shed a much more substantial amount of his grace 27 years ago, and it fell to earth to inhabit an unborn child."

"Are you saying that there is a human angel running around?" Dean demanded.

"Not...exactly."  
"Then what, exactly, Cas?" The sooner they knew what the hell they were dealing with, the better.

"Her father was human, but her mother was something...other. I don't know what she was. But she possessed a power of music. She sang, and her voice was infused with a power, and that power could do anything. She could heal, or calm an out-of-hand situation. Likewise, she could use it to manipulate men. From what I understand, though, she truly loved the father of her child, and only used her power for something not entirely of the good once."  
"What was it?"  
"Unimportant. Denna-that's my...sister's-name, she has part of that power, although much diluted, and the angel grace in her DNA. She isn't an angel, isn't a vessel, but is...part angel for lack of a better term."

"Okay." Sam said was the counterpart to Dean's hot-headedness, and he knew in this case specifically, his was the cooler head that must prevail. "So what does this have to do with us?"

"Denna was hurt a few years ago, before I consumed the souls. Nothing supernatural, but human. She was in a relationship, and was going to marry some human. They were attacked walking home one night, and he was killed. The attackers kept her for 3 months before I found her and freed her. They were...unkind, to her. They hurt her. I killed them."  
"Still not really seeing the point." Dean commented.

"She is stuck. She is hurting, and it is spilling over to splash on any near her. She gets into fights with human men, trying to protect human women. She is also a hunter, like you. She loses herself, though. Anything can trigger a flashback , and when that happens, she thinks she is still there, and fights to free herself. Sometimes, bystanders get hurt. She is hurting people that she shouldn't."

Dean bit back a sigh, grudgingly admitting to himself that protecting those innocents, was kinda what they did best.

"What would you like **us** to do? It doesn't sound like you want us to kill her." Sam observed.

"No, I would not like you to kill her. Angels aren't very good at emotions, but I do understand family. I...care...for Denna." Cas paused, and looked like he was considering how to speak his next sentence.

"I need you to help her remember her humanity. To help her heal through her memories."

Dean looked confused. "Your the one with the magic finger healing thing, Cas. Why not just…" He gestured with his fingers, "Bop her. Make her better."

"I could do so, but this deals directly with the mind and emotions. I don't have to tell you that I am not skilled in either of those areas."  
"Ain't that the understandment." Dean agreed readily.

"She needs physical human contact. She needs to understand that not all contact and intimacy is bad. That intimacy isn't supposed to hurt."  
"Cas…" Sam interjected. "You realize that it sounds like you want us to sleep with your sister. I don't think you mean-"

"If that is what it takes, then, yes, that is exactly what I want you to do. I want you to seduce my sister."

Sam stopped, floored, while Dean jerked a bit, taken aback. "Okay...why us?"  
"Because if there are two stronger humans on this or any other earth, I have yet to meet them. Denna is powerful, and I know that you can handle her. Also...I wouldn't trust anyone else with my little sister. I know that there are institutions, but I won't put her there." He looked to Sam, knowing that the big man would understand, and Sam nodded, remembering both their experience with the mental ward. The boys sat quietly for a moment, digesting the compliment and the request. Perhaps too quietly, too long, for Cas spoke again. "If you cannot or will not accept my request, I will have to take her to heaven."  
Sam's head jerked up. "You don't mean you'll kill her!"

Cas looked confused. "No, of course not. I mean she will need to be separated from humanity for awhile. I'd have to take her to the Waiting Room. Dean, I believe that you are familiar with it?"

"Hell, yes I'm familiar." Dean growled, remembering what had to have been one of the most excruciating waits in his life, and he had gone to Hell and fricking Purgatory. "I hate that place. What else do we need to know about her?"

"She has some angelic powers, as I said. She can smite demons if she is well enough, and...do the magic finger healing thing, I believe you called it. She can teleport, again, if she is strong enough. But not far, and it wears her out quickly. She is a most fearsome fighter. And she hates guns."  
"What?" Dean was all kinds of confused. "What does she gank shit with, then?"  
"A sword."  
"You mean an angel sword?"  
"No. More like a claymore."

"What, full-on Braveheart?" he demanded.

"I don't understand."

"Here." Sam allayed the situation by pulling up a picture of the sword Mel Gibson made famous on his computer. "Is this the kind of sword she carries?"

Cas craned his neck to see, then nodded. "A fair facsimile to that."

Dean swore in appreciation. "One strong bitch." Then he realized what he said, and backpedaled. "Not, I mean, that your sister is a-"  
"No, she would agree with you, no matter how many times I tried to persuade her otherwise."

Dean regained his feet and pulled three bottle from one of the packs on the table and handed one to his brother and his friend. "So to recap." He remarked, twisting the top off of the glass bottle. "Your part angel, part human, part something, _sister _who is all kinds of powerful and dangerous, is dealing with severe PTSD and she's freaking out, and you want us to what? _Sleep_ withher to fix it? I got that about right?"

"I think it's a little more complicated that that, Dean." Sam interjected. "I've been doing a lot of reading on PTSD lately, and one of the constant things I'm coming up with is physical contact as

a way to combat anxiety and panic. It seems that having someone to hang on to, especially someone they can trust, helps significantly during panic attacks. It help to ground the person, and give them something tangibly real to focus on. Like you did with my scar when I was seeing Lucifer. The pain helped ground me to this world. I realise now that it wasn't really the healthiest way to cope, but it helped. From what Cas is saying, his sister was hurt, probably sexually," Here he looked over at Castiel for confirmation, and received it when the angel could not meet his eyes. "And being near people, especially being touched, can cause that hurt to bubble back up, sending her to a place in her mind where she relives it over and again. We've both experienced that to some extent, right? Between Hell, and Purgatory, and all of our other shit, there cannot be people who know more about dealing with this than us." Sam met Dean's eyes, who saw the need to help in his brother's face.

"Well, yeah, but we aren't exactly the picture of copacetic." Dean pointed out wearily.

"We don't have to be. We're stable, kind of. We have beds to go back to, and we know how to compartmentalize. She doesn't have that. I think, what she really needs right now is stability, and we can give her that."

"The last time I saw her…" Cas started, but paused, seeming to chew on his words.

"What about it?" Dean asked, watching his friend. Cas was worried. It was obvious in his body language and in his tone.

"The last time I saw her, I had to pull her out of a fight at a bar before the human police were called. I asked her later why she attacked the man, and she said he put his hands on her. It was a casual touch, not meant to harm or to offend, but she said it burned and it felt like knives on her skin. She said that when he touched her, it hurt her so badly that she thought she was still in the warehouse, and couldn't stop herself from reacting. After I got her out of there, she sat in the corner of her motel room and shook for hours. She wouldn't look at me or talk to me. She cried a little, but mostly she shook. I don't really understand what is wrong, but I do understand that she is hurting, and that worries me." He looked up then, and the brothers saw the fear in their friend's eyes. Not just concern, not just worry. He was afraid for his sister. This more than anything else, spoke to Dean. It was the same way he would always cave to Sam when they were little; stupid older brother instincts. Sam knew it too; looking at Dean regard the burdened Castiel, he knew that his brother had made his decision.

"Cas." Dean leaned forward and nudged Cas's knee with is beer bottle. "We'll do anything we can to help your sister. You know that, or you wouldn't have come to us. But why now?"

"What?" Cas was confused.

"What Dean is asking is, why haven't you told us about her before, and why do it now, as she is getting worse, when we could have helped before." Sam clarified.

Cas finally looked at the bottle in his hand and after regarding it a second, he down half of it swiftly while both pair of Winchester eyebrows shot heavenwards. He lowered the bottle and looked at them. "_**Nobody**_ knows about her. When Naomi conditioned me, she took every secret I had, _except_ Denna. When Metatron was in my head he took over my entire being, _except_ the part that is Denna's. She is the only secret I have buried so deeply within myself that not even Heaven could find it. I found out about her when she called to me as a tiny child. My name was written on her heart, and it was the first word from her mouth. I have worked her entire life to keep her safe, and every regret that I have that isn't about you two or Heaven is for her. I was so wrapped up in 'fixing' Heaven that I didn't hear her pray to me until it was too late. This is my fault, and now I must ask you to help clean up my mess, once again."

"Hey, now." Dean waved that aside, the pain in Cas's face bringing out the more compassionate side of him that seemed only to exist to a few people. "We're family, right? This is what we're for."

Cas's eyes filled with relief. "Thank you. Both of you. I know that if anyone can help her, it's you."

Straight to business, Dean stretched out his legs and asked, "So where is she?"

"Brunswick, Maine, when I checked on her a few hours ago."

Sam and Dean glanced at each other and came to a silent decision. "Can you zap us and the Impala over there?" Dean asked.

"I can, yes."

"No damage to my baby?" Dean had to be sure; that car's safety was overshadowed only by Sam's and Cas's.

"None."

"Awesome. Let us load up the car and check out, and let's go get her."

"Now?"  
"Yeah. It's only 7, and we're done with the revenant. It'd be a what, 40 hour drive from here?"

Dean looked at Sam, who nodded in agreement. "Yeah, about that."

"So, zap-zap, Sparky." Dean flashed that cocky grin at Cas.

10 minutes later, the Impala was packed, and Castiel was reaching for their foreheads. A flash of light and the sound of wings later, they were standing in the courtyard of an entirely different motel. Dean shook his head and grinned slightly at Sam, both thinking the same thing; Roadtrips with Castiel might not become a thing in the future if it didn't involve an actual trip. Or, y'know, a road.

"This is where she intends to be." Cas told them. After a glance around, "She isn't here yet." They were headed for the motel entrance, when Cas cocked his head, as if listening. "Someone is calling me. It isn't you or her. I'll be right back." And he was gone.

Shrugging at each other, the boys ducked into the office and checked in.

As they unpacked the Impala, a scream rang through the gathering gloom. Yanking out pistols and the knife, they ran toward the sound. It was coming from a long alley behind the motel, and they barreled down it to the struggling figures at the other end. As they neared, they could distinguish four large shapes attacking one slighter shape.

The smaller figure held off its attackers with a sword.


	2. Chapter 2

**Again, most bountiful of thanks to my beautiful, bodacious, bitchin' Beta, JazMitch. If anya yous is in the Stephanie Plum fandom, check out her stuff!**

Chapter Two.

Sam and Dean threw themselves into the fray. Sam slammed the Knife up between the ribs of one of the attackers and flames flickered out of the mouth and eyes of the demon as it died. Another fell to the flickering blade of the sword and it's wielder's face was illumined by more death-flames. Dean shot one of them, and Sam's Knife and the sword impaled the last one at the same time. As the respective demons fell to the floor, Sam and Dean turned to the sword-fighter. The blade tip leveled at the men, and the young woman wielding it leaned against the alley wall in exhaustion.

"_Don't judge a thing til you know what's inside it._" She sang at them. "_Don't push me-I'll fight it!_

_Never gonna give in, never gonna give it up, no!_"

Her voice was clear and pure, but was heavy with fatigue. Her brown hair was caught back in a braid, but flyaway wisps were plastered to her face by the sweat running from her temples.

The brothers looked at each other in uncertainty, wondering what to do.

"Um," Sam stepped forward. "We aren't here to hurt you." He placated, as he stepped, huge frame bent to make himself seem less threatening, one hand stretched to her. He held her gaze steadily, aiming to reassure his with his eyes the way he didn't with his words.

He was still met with the sword. She was visibly drained, but she still fended him off without wavering even a fraction.

"My name is Sam, and this is my brother, Dean Winchester. We're hunters. Are you Denna?" Sam tried again.

She looked at him, her chest moving hard as she tried to regain her breath, and she nodded.

"Denna, we're here because your brother asked us to help you." The point didn't lower, and her demeanor didn't change.

"Your brother Castiel? The angel? He's worried about you, and brought us here so we could help you. Do you understand?"  
She nodded.

"Can you put the sword down? We aren't going to hurt you." He reiterated.

Denna's gaze flew down, and she looked surprised to see the sword in her hand. The tip of blade thunked into the ground as her arm sagged. She looked back up at the big hunters with a wary gaze.

"_No one knows what it's like,_" She sang again.

"_To be the bad man, _

_to be the sad man_

_Behind blue eyes._"

"What the hell?" Dean demanded.

"Dean, it's a Who song, Behind Blue Eyes. She's describing Cas. The sad man behind blue eyes."

Denna nodded once, tiredly.

"Was it a test, to see if we really know him?" Sam questioned her, and she nodded again.

"Denna, is this how you communicate? You speak by singing?" At another nod, Dean spoke up again. "Cas didn't say anything about it."

"Well, he likely didn't notice. Communication is communication to him, and humans are weird. He probably dismissed it as a quirk. He does that."

"Okay, why? Why do you sing instead of talk?" Dean asked Denna.

She gave him the most beaten shrug that he'd ever seen.

"_It's all the same!"_ Her voice rang out, "_Only the names have changed!"_

Dean broke into a huge grin. "Okay, now I don't give a damn. Damn good taste in music, Den. You wanna come sit down, get cleaned up, while we wait for Cas to get back?"

Her eyes got hard and the sword snapped back up. _"We live this life, breath to breath, we're all the same, we all bleed red."_

"Denna, I don't understand. You don't want to come with us? I swear we won't hurt you." Sam tried to placate her. She shook her head.

"_We all bleed red."_ She repeated. She dragged the tip of her finger along her blade.

Dean tapped his brother's shoulder. "I got this, Sammy. She won't come unless she knows that we aren't demons." He snatched the Knife from Sam's belt and laid open a small cut on his hand. "I dunno how good you can see in this light, but-red-blooded American, through and through." He handed the Knife back to his brother, and Sam followed suit. Pushing off the wall, Denna nodded and finally sheathed her sword.

"Okay, great. We have a room here," Sam told her. "Are you okay to walk a little bit?"

Even in the fading light, her look of derision was fully visible. She grabbed a duffel bag from where it had lain unnoticed by the Winchesters in the road and stalked alongside them, not long of leg, but having no problem keeping up with Sam's mile-eating stride. She was dressed much like they were, in jeans and a red flannel over a black t-shirt, only much bloodier, with the substance matting in her hair and stiffening clothes.

Sam opened the motel room door, and stepped through. Dean went next so that Denna wouldn't have someone standing behind her. Cas appeared in the room just as she was entering.  
"You found her." Cas said, tired eyes breaking into a smile. She smiled back and hugged her brother. He pulled her back and looked her up and down, taking in the drying blood that covered her clothing. "Are you alright?"

She nodded, singing, "_I pay in blood, but not my own._"

Dean was getting a huge kick out of this. "Gotta say, Den-you got a way better voice than Dylan ever did. Cas, you didn't tell me your sister was awesome!"

Castiel looked at his sister apologetically. "He takes some getting used to. And he seems incapable of using an individual's name correctly. He stopped using my my full name almost immediately after we met."

Dean waved him off and went back outside to get the rest of the stuff from the Impala.

"Hey, Cas, can you explain why Denna doesn't talk?" Sam queried as he set his books and laptop on the little table native to all motel rooms.

Castiel looked at him like Sam had suddenly gone stupid. "She does."

"Well, she communicates, sure, but she doesn't exactly...converse. She sings her answers, like a riddle."

Castiel frowned at him, then at Denna, who shrugged at him like she was giving permission. "She has spoken this way since I rescued her. I'm the only one she talks to, and singing to herself is how she keeps from going mad. She knows the lyrics to every song and poem ever written-something she inherited from her mother. I find it quite a nice manner of communication."

"No!" Sam was quick to attempt to waylay any miscommunication and turned to Denna. "It's not that it isn't, it's neat, and I think Dean gets a major charge from it, because he's such a classic-rock junkie. I just needed to know, after what Cas told us earlier, that you aren't trying to put some sort of whammy on us. It's just a paranoid precaution, like when you had Dean and I prove that we weren't demons."

She grinned at him. "_Why should I worry? Why should I care?" _

Sam squinted at her, then sent a fast peek out the door. "Isn't that from a kids movie?"

"Is what from a kids movie?" Dean asked, stomping through the door.

"Uh, nothing." Sam hastened, turning away before his brother could see his ears pink up.

"Cas, have you explained what the deal is to Denna?" Dean asked, dumping the duffels on the respective beds.

"Not...as such."

Denna's eyes got wary and she turned to face her powerful brother. She was not terribly tall, certainly nowhere near Sam's behemoth height, but she was no slip of a thing. She stood an inch or so shorter than Cas, and her eyes bore easily into his. She should not have been an imposing figure, but as she stood there, covered in blood not her own, long brown hair tightly woven into a thick rope, a sword strapped behind her shoulder like some medieval warrior, facing down an angelic being without fear or any intention of backing down, the brothers could not help but hold respect for her. She was one of them. This life wasn't easy, and the people who

lived it were often fierce, and fiercely broken, and they gained a **look** after awhile. They all had eyes that said "I've looked into hell, and it looked away first."

Cas looked nervously at the boys. "Do you wish me to..._zap _you back to the bunker tonight?"

"Nah," Dean demured. "We've already paid for the room, and if you do that too often, me and Sammy'll get flabby. Plus, it really messes with me. Road trip back will give Denna some time to decide if she can stand hanging around us for an indefinite amount of time. Your brother's been worried about you." He directed this at Denna. "And wants you to spend some time with me and Sam, til you know that your head's in the right place. He can try explaining, but you know you're going to be confused after. Just know, this is only with your consent. We are scary bastards, but we don't do kidnapping. C'mon, Sammy." Sam unfolded his long legs, and followed his brother to the door. "We'll give you two some space."

The brothers headed out to lean on the car, and breathe in the quickly darkening sky, leaving two pairs of blue eyes to stare at one another.

"What Dean said, about my being worried about you…" Cas trailed off, then started again. "I have been very worried about you. Then, the last time we we were together, you told me what being around people is like. For you." He really was very bad at people skills that didn't involve battle. "When I first was human, it was very strange, and disconcerting, and sometimes terrifying. But it was good, even when it was bad, and it was never painful. Not the being human. That can be very painful. But being around people, it wasn't bad. And I am...concerned, about you. If you keep blanking out, and trying to kill people, I worry about what will happen to you. Both mentally, and your physical well being. We are very strong, but there are always enemies stronger."

"_I have constant fear that something's always near, Fear of the dark, fear of the dark." _She sang to him, her eyes downcast and shamed.

"I know, Denna, and from what I am told, this is not an abnormal response to trauma. But you are supernaturally powerful, and your reaction could cause harm to people who are innocent of wrongdoing. I want you to go with Sam and Dean, stay with them, and let them give you a safe place to heal."

"_I will not be moved, unless you tell me the whole truth. I am owed this." _

"I know you are, and I am trying. It is hard to say, correctly...I want you to allow Sam and Dean to help you be more comfortable with physical contact."

Denna's eyes went hard and cold as she all but snarled the song at him. "_So we found this motel-it was a place I knew well. Oh, and we made magic all night?!" _She was decidedly unhappy.

"I would not do that to you. You know that. I just want you to try being around them, being close. I would, and have, trusted them with my life on several occasions. They are safer to be around, then wandering around by yourself. Safer for you, and for the unknowing humans. Please, Denna?"

She didn't answer right away, which Cas took as a good sign. She didn't reject it out of hand, at least. He let her think until the silence stretched, and then he placed his hands on her shoulders. "I am truly concerned for you, Denna. And this is the only way I can see that doesn't end badly. If you wish to continue as you are, I will support you, but...that path worries me."

Denna sighed, and nodded. "_And I will try my best to find a smile, and I will close my eyes and say I'm not afraid." _

"Thank you." He pulled his sister into a hug, a gesture that had never seemed alien to him around her. His heavenly brethren did not show affection physically, and around humans, everything was odd, but somehow, he never had a problem being affectionate with his little sister. She was special. When they finally pulled back, Cas opened the door and stepped outside. The hunters stood up from where they'd been leaning on the car, making light conversation.

"Well?" Dean asked him.

"Denna has agreed to at least attempt to remain with you for a while. I admit, this sets my mind greatly at ease. Thank you both for understanding."  
"Hey, man, anytime." Sam clapped his shoulder. "Family."

"So." Dean punched Cas's arm lightly, and effectively sidestepped a 'chick-flick moment'. "You gonna hang out?"

"No. I have a pressing engagement elsewhere. I am suitably assured that Denna isn't going to be in peril tonight, so I'm going to have to leave. I will...see you later." His voice turned up at the end of the sentence, making it less of a statement and more a question. The brothers shared a small chuckle and nodded. "See ya later, Cas."

At the fluttering of wings, he was gone.

They headed back towards the door to their room, where Denna was leaning on the frame. "Hey." Dean tapped his brother's arm as they approached, and they both made fists.

They shook, threw, and when Sam turned up paper, Dean's scissors told the taller man where he was sleeping.

"Okay, so Sammy and I hashed it out," Dean informed the woman waiting for them. "He'll be sleeping on the floor tonight, so you can have the other bed. Are you hungry or anything? We already ate, but we've got food and beer."

She shook her head no, and sang, "_Just stand in the rain, you won't drown…_"

"Just the shower, then?" Dean asked, grinning triumphantly as she nodded, enjoying figuring out her lyric puzzles. It was kind of fun! "You do your thing, and me and Sam are gonna hit the sack. It's been a long day."

Denna nodded, and turned to go deeper into the room. She unbuckled the leather belt that lay crossways against her chest, holding her sheathed sword against her back. When she would have lain it against the wall, Dean stopped her. "Hey, can I see that?"

Sam rolled his eyes at his brother. "Yep. _I'm_ the nerd."

Denna shrugged and passed her weapon over, then headed for the bathroom.

She heard the men in the other room making good natured jibes at each other, and Dean exclaiming at the heft of her weapon, as she peeled out of the sweaty, bloody clothes that clung stiffly to her frame. Stepping under the warm spray, she felt the water sting against the little cuts from where the demons had gotten in lucky strikes. She stood under the warm wet sluicing over her skin until the water at her feet no longer ran black and red with blood. Soaping her hair, she dug her fingers into her tired scalp, working loose the grime and blood that had been there all day. She'd woken up this morning, gotten out of her car, slammed the door, and been thrown forward by the explosion as the concussion ignited the bomb on the undercarriage. She'd been running since she'd picked herself up off the floor and seen demons stalking her way. It was like the damn things could smell her. She knew there was a price on her head in Hell, so lots of penny-ante demons were gunning for her, but she couldn't figure out how they always found her, no matter where she went or what she did. It was becoming worrisome. Sighing, she scrubbed the last of the soap away, then turned off the water. After she dressed, she dried the floor and the bathtub so there was no wayward wet anywhere.

She silently stepped through the door into the bigger room. The light was out, and Sam lay stretched out in between the beds, only discernable by the large feet sticking out into the room. Dean was atop the bed farthest away from her, but sleeping right on the edge of the bed, his body turned towards his brother's, as if pulled there. Moving easily in the dark, she crouched by Sam's shaggy head and placed a hand on his brow. He was having a quiet nightmare, dreaming of wandering the pathways of heaven, searching, searching endlessly for Dean through all of the personal heavens of the righteous dead, only to find that it wasn't heaven at all, but his hell. He was doomed to wander, ever alone, ever searching, with the voices of his demons whispering the reasons he would never see his brother again, no matter how long and hard he looked.

Denna withdrew her hand. It was so lonely in the younger Winchester's head. It was heartbreaking. She didn't think there was anything sadder. Then, she laid a palm on Dean's forehead, only to find that she was wrong.

Dean was having the same dream.

These brothers, still boys in so many ways. They loved each other with a determination that defied Heaven, and Hell. They would fight and die, and sell their own souls for each other, and the thing that scared each of them most…

Was losing the other.

Denna knelt there in the dark that sheltered them, and with a hand touching each brother, she sang a prayer over them, ever so softly, letting it fill their minds and ease their souls.

_Hail, Mary…_

_Full of grace…_

It was a song angels sang, and the lullaby with which her mother soothed away her own nightmares as a child. It filled the empty spaces in the night, and gently smoothed the rough edges that the day had raised in their psyche.

_The Lord is with thee._

_Blessed art you among women…_

Slowly, their dreams eased, their breathing gentled. A dream of their heaven began to take shape, a heaven where both were present. Of course they were. There was no Dean without Sam, and no Sam alone. They were the Winchester brothers, and if you poked one with a stick, it was the other who felt it and yanked away the stick to beat you with it.

..._and blessed is the fruit of your womb, Jesus._

_Holy Mary, Mother of God…_

Withdrawing her hand from Dean's brow, she moved, bent, and easily lifted Sam from the floor, as if the big man were a child. She placed him on the opposing bed from Dean's, and pulled the covers over him, making sure he wouldn't throw them off in his sleep. With that, she turned to go back to the bathroom, nicking a blanket from the tiny chest next to the door.

_Pray for us sinners now, _

_and at the hour of our death…_

_Amen._

Pulling a long bladed dagger from its sheath, she stepped into the tub and lay down, with a folded towel for a pillow. She crossed her arms over her chest, dagger tightly gripped in one hand, and closed her eyes. She fell asleep with the practiced quickness of one who doesn't know how long she will be able to sleep, and knows to make every second count.

**Lyrics: You Can't Take Me, by Bryan Adams. Behind Blue Eyes, by The Who. Wanted Dead or Alive, by Bon Jovi. Bleed Red, by Ronnie Dunn. Pay in Blood, by Bob Dylan. Why Should I Worry? by Billy Joel. Fear of the Dark, by Iron Maiden. This is All, Now, by Taking Back Sunday. All I Want to Do is Make Love to You, by Heart. I Will Try, by Deaf Havana. Stand in the Rain, by Superchick. The Hail Mary. **


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

_It was dark in the warehouse, and cold in the cage. She pressed herself against the unforgiving iron bars and shivered. Had she a blanket, or clothes at all, it wouldn't have been so bad. But they had left her with nothing. She raised her head to look at the tiny sliver of moon that was barely visible through the hole in the roof. _

"The winter here's cold, and bitter, and it chills us to the bone. I haven't seen the sun for weeks, too long, too far from home_**.**__" _

_Singing helped, the music reverberating around her in the warehouse full of...she wasn't sure what. It calmed her, eased, slightly, the pain in her heart. They'd killed Craig. _

_They'd been walking home that night, and two men had walked up to them, raised a gun, and shot Craig in the head. She screamed, her lover's blood covering her face and clothes, and threw herself at the men. She tried, she tried her hardest to hurt them. She punched at them, and kicked, and tried to gouge out their eyes. She got in a few good licks, but her screams were cut short by the tranquilizer they jabbed into her neck. _

_She woke up naked, in this warehouse. By her count, that had been almost two months ago. Not a day had gone by that she hadn't wept yet. She hurt, and not simply from the severity of the beatings she got when she fought her captors. Her heart was a stone inside her chest, and she wished once again that either someone would save her, or they would just kill her. But no-one came, and they kept her alive, and the hurt was just too much to bear. So she sang. It got her into trouble, but she did it anyways. It was the only release she had for the pressure built up inside herself. _

"I feel just like I'm sinking, though I claw for the solid ground.

I'm pulled down by the undertow, never thought I could feel so low!

Oh, darkness I feel like letting go! If all of the strength and all of the courage-_"_

_Something slammed against her cage bars and rang hollowly in the mostly empty warehouse. The door was opened and she was yanked out by her hair. As soon as she cleared the cage, she fell on her attacker, fighting, clawing, biting everything that fell into her reach. The big man backhanded her and she fell to the ground, bleeding from her mouth and nose.  
"I told you not to make anymore noise, bitch!" He shouted at her, then kicked viciously at her. He beat her until she could no longer move, then hurt her some more. Then suddenly he was inside her, under her skin, breaking her from the inside out. Was he trying to possess her? Like the demons her angelic brother fought?_

_But no. He was just a man, and she knew that if she just tried a little harder, she could expel him from her skin and kill him. She could do it. As if by magic, there was a knife in her hand, and screaming, she dug it into her own skin and watched evil blackness ooze out. It wasn't enough. She did it again, and again, until…there was nothing…_

Sam rolled over in the surprisingly comfortable motel-bed and pushed his hair out of his eyes. Wait. Bed? He looked down at the floor where he had gone to sleep. There was a rumpled pillow there, but nothing else.

"Dean." He shifted out of the bed to poke his brother awake. The pillow where his brother's head would be moved slightly, and made a disgruntled noise.

"Dean!" Sam demanded louder.

"What." The single, irritated syllable groaned it's way from Dean's throat.  
"Dude, did you put me in bed last night?"

That woke his brother up. Dean's head jerked up, the pillow falling away, to stare at Sam.

"No. What the hell? I left you on the floor. Denna slept in the bed."

"No, she didn't. I just woke up in the bed. You think-you think **she** put me there?"  
"How could she have? She's tiny. **You** are Gigantor. Where the hell is she, anyways?" He asked, sitting up and moving his feet to the floor.

" I dunno, I don't see her. You think she bailed?"

"Nah, man, her sword's right where I left it."

Sam stepped towards the bathroom door as Dean reached for the curtain to check outside. Dean swung around as he heard his brother swearing in the bathroom. When he got there, the first thing he saw was black-red streaks on the outside of the tub. He followed them up, to the arm laying on the top edge. Denna lay there in the tub, clasping a knife. There were deep shadows under her closed lids, and the dried and darkening blood was a harsh contrast to her pale skin. His profanity made his brother's pale in comparison. "Is she alive?" He demanded of Sam, who was kneeling on the floor by the tub. Sam's fingers touched Denna's neck to find her pulse, and several things happened at once, or seemed too.

The very instant that Sam touched her, Denna's eyes flew open, and the hand that didn't have a knife jerked up to grab at Sam's, shoving it away from her. She let go as if she had grasped fire and screamed at the pain of her wounds being ripped open again, her drying blood having fused her skin to the tub. She sat up in haste and, gasping, looked down at her arm. The Winchesters watched her eyes go wide in horror. She lifted her knife, saw the blood on the edges, and flung it away from herself.

Sam had recovered enough from her sudden awakening by now to place a hand on Denna's back and lean forward to soothe her. She flinched at the contact and looked up at him, fear bright in her eyes. The word '_what_' was framed by her lips over and again, but no sound came out.

"Denna!" Sam called her name to focus her attention on him. When her eyes fluttered back to his, tears forming in them, he asked gently, "Can I help you out of the tub?" At her shaky nod, he stood, bent, and lifted her in his arms to carry her out of the bathroom. She shuddered in his arms until he set her down on the bed he'd slept in.

Dean handed Sam a wet towel and their first-aid kit. As he worked over her, trying to clean away the dried blood and the new that was welling up, Denna shuddered, jerking uncontrollably. She didn't seem able to stop.

Dean finally sat next to her, and took her other hand in his. She flinched once again at the contact, but did not pull away. Her eyes flew like startled birds from her bloody arm, to Dean, back to Sam, then Dean again and their clasped right hands. Dean's left one came up to rub her back, and his voice was low in her ear, rumbling soothingly deep in his chest.

"Hey, Denna. I know this whole thing is pretty scary, but it's gonna be okay right? Sammy'll patch you right up. He's done it millions'a times for me." When she still shook, her breath uncontrolled and hyperventilating her way through this full-blown panic attack, his hand squeezed hers, providing comfort with his solid and unwavering strength. "I have an idea, Den. When my mom was upset, she'd sing. And I already know you like to sing. Can you do that for me, Den? Can you sing something? It might make you feel a little calmer. How'sat for a plan?"

Her breath drew in jerkily, and her voice quaked, but she did as he asked and tried to sing between gasps of air.

"_King Arthur's knights-they-filled the table Round-save for one who-stood before them._" Her voice shuddered, but it was getting stronger. Dean watched her close her eyes and draw in one long, deep breath, then let it out slowly. On her next inhale, her voice was lower, but stronger, and he could see her gaining control.

"_For once without a weapon, for once he stood in shame. The trial's charge was treason, and betrayal of an oath, and should his guilt be proven, Death would fall on traitors both._"

It was getting easier for her, and Dean loosened his grip on her, but didn't let her go. She sat straighter, her head bowed. She no longer shook under Sam's gentle hands, but her back was stiff and her muscles were tense. Sam looked up towards her. "This one cut needs stitches, but the others aren't that deep." Denna opened her eyes to see a cleaner arm than she had before. There were three long cuts across the belly of her forearm. One was nought more than a deep scratch, and the other was nothing to worry about. They'd already mostly stopped bleeding. But the last one gaped open, an inch across and three or four inches long. It was a more dangerous wound than many she'd gotten in the past year of fighting demons and other creatures.

"I can stitch it up now," Sam continued, "Or I can take you over to a hospital, if that would be better."

Denna shook her head vehemently at the mention of the hospital and her hand clenched hard in Dean's.

"Hey, okay." He told her. "No hospital. We get that. Can't stand 'em ourselves." He nodded to his brother, and Sam got out their 'sewing kit'. It held a long, thin silver needle, black industrial thread, and a hooked pair of scissors. Sam reached into his brother's bag and pulled out a full bottle of whiskey.

When he offered it to Denna, she took it from him and downed a very respectable amount. She lowered the bottle from her lips and cocked her head to the side as if considering. She looked at the bottle, shrugged, and took another hit. Sam and Dean watched her, seemingly unable to decide between shock or respect. She handed the half-empty glass container back to Sam and he looked from her to the bottle and back again. "Note to self." He muttered as he set it on the floor and prepared the needle. "Do not, under any circumstances, allow Denna and Dean to go drinking together." A tiny chuckle issued itself from Denna's mouth, and was matched with Dean's. She'd heard tirade after lecture about the man's drinking from Castiel, her brother shaking his head over all the times he'd found his friend working his way through several bottles of whiskey, and the many times he'd had to repair Dean's liver and arteries. The older Winchester's propensity for alcohol was legendary.

She was quiet as the needle slipped into her skin, pulling closed the lips of the tear in her flesh. She was silent when Sam tied the first knot, Dean helping him to hold the wound closed. She was soundless through the entire ordeal, even as a burning pooled in her eyes. She was still, and calm, and immovable as stones.

Sam was quiet when his hand shook, and he knew he'd pulled too hard, knew he'd hurt her more than necessary. He was silent as her warm tears fell on his hands, and near his stitching. He was soundless as he worked over their charge. His hands were capable and calm, and sure as the morning.

Dean was quiet as he held her. He was silent when he saw the moment she broke, the moment it grew to be too much, and tears filled her eyes, falling on his brother's big hands. He was soundless as he lent what support he could to the confused young woman at his side. He was quiet, and calm, and close as a brother.

When the last stitch was sewn and the thread tied off, Sam let out a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding.

"Okay."

He gently wiped away the last of the blood that had seeped through his tiny, careful stitches, and applied a salve from the kit that soothed some of the ache. Sam wrapped her forearm in cotton gauze and sat back on his heels.

"Alright?" He asked her.

Denna had extracted her hand from Dean's and wiped away all evidence of her tears, while he'd pretended not to notice, and now she nodded.

"Do you think you can tell us what happened? It didn't look like you did it on purpose."

"_When the darkness creeps in, I feel my nightmares watching me._" She whispered.

"We've all had those," Dean agreed. "Was it about before Cas found you? In the warehouse? You were obviously scared, Den." He remarked when she glanced over at him. "Nothing scares people like us the way that old memories do."

She looked away, and gave him a tiny little nod.

"_The nights go on, waiting for a light that never comes…_"

She paused for a bare moment, and tried again. "_Crawling in my skin-these wounds, they will not heal. Fear is how I fall, confusing what is real._"

She shuddered and fell silent.

"It's going to be okay, Denna." Sam told her. He was still kneeling by her feet, but his eyes were level with hers even so. "This is why Cas wants you to hang around us for awhile. We can help. These things...we never forget them. They never fade, and they don't go away. But we can get used to them. And someday, it will hurt just a tiny bit less, just a bit slower. It's the steps to get there that are the hardest. But you can do it. You're strong."

He sounded so sincere. More, he sounded like someone who knew about nightmares, and hurting. She could almost believe him when he said it…

The next couple of hours were spent finding food, packing up, and getting ready to hit the road. Neither of the Winchesters left her by herself during those hours. Dean sat cleaning his gun when Sam went for food, and they switched off with each other easily as breathing as they loaded the car. They almost made it seem like they weren't doing it on purpose.

To add on to never letting Denna out of their sight, they started initiating little touches as they passed near her. It started awkwardly. Dean patted her shoulder as he walked past her, and had a distinctly uncomfortable look on his face. Sam's hand came to rest at the small of her back when he opened the motel door for her, and almost instantly jerked back, apologizing with pinking ears. She nodded in answer, and seemed to let it pass.

The little touches continued as they bustled, preparing to leave. Sam's sleeve brushing hers as he reached over her for his laptop, and little things like that.

They did not, exactly, make her uncomfortable, but very nearly. She knew that they were initiating the contact in an effort to help her become used to it happening accidentally, either with them or in a public setting. But.

When people touched her, it hurt. Not entirely in a physical sense, but she could 'feel' the contact burning her skin, radiating out in pulses that made her skin crawl and itch and it _hurt_. It burned and felt like she was having her skin flayed off with a pin. It hurt, and there was only so much she could take. It was why she lashed out at strangers that touched her, in an attempt to keep them off of her. It hurt, and it scared her.

When the Winchesters did it, she watched it coming, and tried not to let herself stop them. She couldn't keep from flinching, though, especially when it wasn't a solid touch. It hurt more the smaller it was. She could see them doing it, and knew that it was to try and help her, but it still hurt. It still burned, and she still cringed, flashing back to the warehouse. But she couldn't tell them…

They were soon packed into the Impala, and off on their 40-hour drive from Maine to Kansas. As they drove through Brunswick, Sam nudged Dean's arm, and motioned for him to pull over at a drugstore almost out of town. Dean made a half-hearted complaint, but did as his brother asked.

A few minutes later, Sam's long stride carried him quickly back to the car, holding a small plastic bag and a bottle of water. Getting into the car, he passed both back to Denna, with instructions to "Take these until it doesn't hurt so bad. If they don't last, we can get more."

She opened the filmy bag to find a bottle of 600mg tablets of ibuprofen. She smiled her thanks to Sam, and took several of the little white pills. Were she a normal human, one would have sufficed. But, she wasn't, and needed a little extra help.

Denna laid her head against the window and let herself be lulled by the soft sound of music coming from the front, and the gentle moving noises of the Impala. She was relaxed for the first time in...too damned long. She felt safe, she realized, in the old black car with the quietly conversing brothers. She wasn't being chased or hunted, and but for her arm, she wasn't in pain. She was stationary, and calm. It was peaceful.

Eventually, she slept.

XX

Sam glanced over his shoulder to the backseat and Denna. "She's out." He told his brother, turning back to the front.

"Told ya." Dean smirked. "My baby knocks everyone out the first time they ride in her."

"That why you've had such a hard time getting a date in the last couple of years? Your car puts them to sleep?"

Dean mocked his brother's sentence and said "You think your sooo funny."

"Absolutely." Sam rejoined, a small, amused grin flickering over his lips at his older brother's antics "In seriousness, though, what are we going to do about Denna when we get home?"

"I dunno, Sammy. It isn't going to be easy, though. This morning proved that…"

Dean trailed off, lapsing into thought. Judging by the tight set of his lips and the way his forehead and eyes scrunched up slightly, Sam could tell his brother's thoughts weren't ones that he was ready to share yet. He knew Dean better than anyone and knew that right now, his brother was deep in thought, serious in a way that he rarely was, and needed a moment to himself. Sam stayed dutifully quiet until Dean lost some of the intensity in his eyes.

"Sam?" He asked after a while.

"Yeah?"

"You notice the scars on her arms?"

Dean caught the motion of Sam's nod out of the corner of his eye.

"I have the feeling that this morning wasn't the first time that this morning has happened."

"I don't think that it can happen many more times, Dean. Some of those scars are new, and looked serious. If it gets much worse, she's not going to wake up some some morning."

He shook his head in slight disbelief as he replayed the events prior in his head.  
"I can't believe she did that in her sleep. To herself. I mean, if she'd attacked one of us, it would make more sense to me. But to turn it inwards like that? I'm worried, Dean."

"Worried is your factory setting, little brother." But the insult was halfhearted. Dean tried never to let Sammy in on his worries, feeling the need to protect his little brother at all costs. He knew that Sam was older now and he didn't have to hide things or rose-tint the situation to ease his brother's mind, but old habits died…well, never, really. Not when it came to protecting Sam. He was trying though. "I am too." He said, almost under his breath.

"We'll figure something out." Sam said this with conviction in his tone. "We always do."

**Lyrics from: Full of Grace, by Sarah Mclachlan. The Trial of Lancelot, by Heather Dale. Nightmares, by Ed Sheeran. Krwling, and A Light That Never Comes by Linkin Park.**


	4. Chapter 4

**All my love and thanks to my Twins, and my beautiful, bitchin' Beta, JazMitch**

Chapter Four

They pulled over before leaving Pennsylvania to get food at a little burger place close to the border. Sam mentioned, as he glanced at the still sleeping Denna in the back, that if his brother ever became a superhero, his power would be finding hole-in-the-wall burger-joints.

"Your superpower would be losing at Rock-Paper-Scissors," Dean rejoined, somewhat ironically. He pulled into a parking spot right outside of the tiny diner, and killed the engine. "I'm gonna go in. You wanna wake up our sleeping beauty back there?"

"Yeah. I don't think she got a lot of rest last night. She's been sleeping pretty hard since we started driving."

"Well, let's get some food in her, and then she can get all the sleep she wants," he decided.

Dean got out of his car and strode towards the door, already shrugging into his bomber jacket even though it was barely fall.

Sam extracted his lanky frame from the low-sitting car, and moved to the back. He opened the door, careful of Denna's head, and knelt beside her. Gently patting her knee, he softly called her name. He'd hardly voiced the first syllable when she jerked upright with a gasp, hand fumbling for her belt, as if she expected to find a knife there.

"Hey." Sam comforted, quiet and unmoving. "Hey, Denna, it's okay. Do you remember where you are?"

She gazed at him with wild eyes, quickly whispering a snatch of song that he couldn't hear, and he waited as the confusion left her eyes.

"You with me, Den?" He asked, unconsciously adopting Dean's nickname for her. She nodded, and he moved back so that she could get out of the car.

"Dean decided that it was time to stop for food. I swear, he can find a place that sells grease in a colony of health-nuts. You hungry?"

She nodded again, which seemed to be her primary mode of communication when she wasn't spouting bits of song lyrics at them. It was getting easier to understand her when she did, and Dean seemed to enjoy the hell out of it, but it still left out a great deal to be desired. She followed him through the rickety door into the bar/restaurant thing. It smelled of grease, for sure, and old smoke, older beer, and sweat. It looked clean enough, and over the less lovely smells hung the scent of frying meat. Which, to be fair, was the only part that Dean really cared about. Sam and Denna crossed the floor to where Dean sat tucked into a booth next to a window. There weren't many customers at this hour of the day, but enough to be friendly, mostly older men, farmers and mechanics, killing time and shooting the shit with the waitresses. As they sat down, Dean looked to Denna.

"I ordered for you, if that's alright." He told her. "A bacon burger. If you want something else, that's cool, I just didn't know how you usually handle fast food."

Denna was smiling, and nodding with one of her characteristic shrugs when a young lady in an apron and jeans, with a name tag reading "Rache" came up to their table.

"Will you all be having something to drink?" She asked, a bright smile covering her pretty face.  
"Coffee for me, thanks." Sam told her, smiling back.

"Okie-dokey, and for you, sweetie?" She directed this to Denna, who gave a little smile and shake of her head, unable to really meet the girl's eyes.

"You sure?''

Denna nodded, still trying, and failing, to meet her gaze.  
"Denna...doesn't really talk." Dean said. He was unsure enough of himself to be a tiny bit hesitant, but Winchester enough to just say it anyways.

"Oh, really?" Immediately, the young lady set her little tray down on the table and, after making sure she had Denna's attention, began to sign to her.

_My little brother is Deaf. _Rache said, hands flickering. _Are you?_

Surprise was written all over everyone's face, Denna's not the least of them. The surprise on the Winchesters' faces got broader when Denna's hands came up and she signed back.

_No. I'm mute, but hearing._

_That's a new one on me. _Rache's hands conveyed interest and mild surprise. _Well. Are you sure you don't want anything to drink?_

_Actually, water would be nice, thank you._

_No problem!_ "I'll be right back with everything!" She said aloud and swished away with her tray.

Sam and Dean looked at each other, looked at Denna, back at each other, and spoke in unison, twin grins alighting their faces. "Cool."

Tentatively smiling, Denna ducked her head and pretended fascination with the table top.

"No, seriously, Denna." Sam said earnestly, smiling at the modest way she received the praise. "That's extremely cool. You'll have to teach us some signs. It could really help out on a hunt sometime."

Denna almost didn't catch the _look_ Sam sent his brother that made the other man pipe in.

"Oh, uh, yeah. Hey, y'know what?" The light bulb went on in Dean's head. "That could actually work. Like if we were sneakin' up on somebody or somethin'. Good thinking, Sammy. Whaddya say, Den? Show us sometime?"

Looking up from the old wooden surface, Denna's hand raised to hover near the side of her face, and her first finger flicked upward from the loose fist as she nodded.

"Is that…yes?" Sam asked.

Denna gave a gentle shake of her head and curled the fingers back into a fist, and rocked it back and forth while nodding exaggeratedly.

"_That's_ yes." Sam guessed, correctly, as it was proven when she nodded, and then made the single finger flickering motion, accompanied by a small, sedate nod.

"O...kay?" It was Dean's turn to hazard a guess, and, it seemed, his turn to be correct when he was rewarded with another little nod. Both Winchesters were gleeful with the little victory of guessing a sign, and they had to practice the little motion over and again, forefingers flicking up to the ceiling, and then asking to be shown the sign for 'yes' again. It was logical that they would follow it up with a request for the sign for 'no', and they enjoyed the simplicity of tapping their first two fingers against their thumbs.

This ate up the time it took for their burgers to cook and be delivered and then Denna resumed her quiet, watchful and wary silence as they ate, listening to the discussion between the hunters about previous burger joints, and whether they had a clean room at something they called "The Bunker", for her, or if they were all still full of the books Sam hadn't gotten around to going through. The question was decided when Sam tapped the table and said, "Charlie's room! We haven't put anything in it since she came back from Oz." He turned to Denna to explain about Charlie. "We have this friend who comes to visit sometimes. She's kind of our little sister, kind of a hunter in training. Last year she took a trip to the Land of Oz, and didn't get back til a couple of months ago. She was extremely upset to miss all the fun. Only Charlie can classify the sacking of Heaven, war between angels, and the return of God as 'fun', however sarcastically." Sam grinned fondly at the thought of their friend, who undoubtedly added spice to the hunt.

Denna nodded to show she understood, and continued eating her fries. Dean's instincts were stellar-this run down little bar-cum-restaurant made amazing food, and she paid the food its due homage.

They ate quickly, and as Denna was pulling out her wallet to chip in her share, she blatantly ignored Sam and Dean's protest that lunch was on them. She took nothing from no-one. She imagined that their revenue sources were similar, but she had put her own work into her own credit card scam. She stood on her own damn feet.

Denna was aware that she was hardly in a place to be proud. She understood more than her brother thought she did. She knew that she was broken, that she was wrong in the head, and getting worse. She'd laid open a man's chest and broken his ribs in that last fight. She'd turned to look at him, to brush him off when he'd touched her back. In that second, she'd thought his eyes were gleaming black, and she reacted. To the touch, to the danger she'd thought she was in, and the pain that the human's proximity caused her. She'd put an innocent man in danger, and it wasn't the first time. She caused pain. She was pain. Made of it, inside and out, and all who came near her felt it.

She knew that unless she stayed with the men her brother called his friends, he would have to kill her. She wouldn't fight him if it came to that. She wasn't sure yet if she really wanted to continue living, but she would not cause her brother that pain. She wouldn't make him murder his little sister, if she could help it at all. Apparently...the only way to help it was to stay with the Winchesters. If she failed, if she fell, maybe they could kill her, instead of Castiel. Not if. When. When she fell-for she knew she would. She could do no less, since she'd been broken. Her only regret would be the hurt it would cause her big brother, though she could fathom no reason why it should anymore. She hadn't been much of a sister since the warehouse.

She jerked out of her reverie when she realized she was blindly following her babysitters out of the building to the car. She knew better than to go mooking off into her own mind around other people. Dammit, she knew **better**! It was dangerous, for her, and for the people around her. If someone laid a hand on her when she wasn't front-and-center paying attention and focused, even the barest of touches, her reaction could land people in the hospital-or the morgue. She shook herself as she followed, and slipped into the backseat behind Sam. After settling in for ride, she swallowed down a few more of the little white ibuprofen pills in hopes that they'd calm her throbbing forearm.

She hated the dreams that caused her to do what she'd done. In normal society, she'd be termed as a 'cutter'. Someone who caused themselves harm on purpose. She didn't, though. She didn't do it on purpose. She never intended to do something to cause herself harm, and never knew she was doing it. She woke up every morning-when she slept-in terror and pain anyway. Didn't she have enough without adding to it on purpose? At least she would never have to explain it to a normal person. Ha. Normal people. The only contact she had with them was trying to avoid them, or, evidently, trying to kill them. But hey-it's the little blessings. Right?

She sat with her less-than-pleasant thoughts behind Sam in the back seat, and quietly observed. She watched the road, and the brothers, and the other cars, few and far between as they were. She sat and she watched as the sky slowly began to color, then darken. She thought her thoughts, and watched, and listened, until it was dark and Dean was pulling into a squat little motel.

Dean turned to look at her in the backseat, where she sat shrouded in shadow. "Do you need us to get two rooms, or do you mind bunking in the same room, for now?"

He watched Denna shake her head. The movement was small, tired. "You don't mind?" He clarified, and received another tiny motion, a nod this time. "Okay. Hang tight, you two."

Dean angled himself out of the Impala and sauntered to the office. He made the necessary noises with the little man who ran the motel, collected the room key, and made his way back to the car. He swung back in and shifted into gear. "We're around back, in 12. I think he said that it's the only room back there. Why'dya think we always get weird motel rooms?" He asked his brother, his tone disgruntled. The hint of a smile tugged at Denna's lips.

"Because that's your other superpower, Dean. Finding quirky little motels," Sam answered immediately, completely deadpanned. He grinned at Dean who, eloquent as ever, flipped him off, before pulling into the one parking spot in a large parking lot behind the motel. Denna joined them in slipping out of the car and gathering their duffels and her sword from the deep trunk of the car. She dutifully trudged in behind them, and set her duffel in an out-of-the-way corner. Denna stood for a moment, and just held her sword, gazing at the leather-sheathed blade.

Sam watched her, out of the corner of his eye, as he moved about in the efficient way he'd been accustomed to in all his years of motel-hopping. She was just standing there, sword in her hands, and head hanging a little. She looked tired, and...grim. She had that hard set about her mouth and brow that Dean always got when he was getting ready for something he particularly did not want to be a part of. The Apocalypse, for example. She seemed to make up her mind about something, and began to move. She bent, and retrieved something small from her duffle bag, and, shoulders squared, headed back out the door. Sam nudged his brother, and they moved to watch, to see what she was doing. Sam stood in the open doorway, and Dean pulled back the curtains to watch through the window. She walked out into the parking lot, and laid her sword at her feet, and proceeded to insert something small-earbuds, they realized-into her ears. She flipped a switch, wrapped the cord that led to the small music player once around her neck, and stuck the MP3 player down her shirt.

Then she started to move. Slow, at first, stretching her neck and shoulders. Then her legs, knees and ankles. When she'd stretched out her limbs, she bent and retrieved her weapon.

Unsheathing it, she dropped the marred and scuffed leather behind her, and took up a stance. From there, it was flashing steel, swinging braid, and quick feet. She moved in a perfect rhythm to the beats only she could hear, and her sword, long, heavy, and cumbersome, was turned into a beautifully flickering instrument as she carved patterns in the air. She was made of motion, and full of the grace that comes with practice born of desperation. She danced with her blade in the abandoned parking lot under a moon that would be full in a matter of days, for twenty minutes or more. When she finally lowered the sword, her hair was plastered to her forehead, and her shoulders sagged with fatigue. She slowly bent for the sheath, and slid her blade home.

As she made her way back to the door, Sam was concerned to see deep black circles under her eyes, where he was sure there had been none before she started her dance.

"Are you alright?" he asked her, hazel eyes sincere, brow furrowed in concern.

She met his eyes squarely for the first time since they'd met in the alley. They struck a chord of fear in him, her eyes. They were full of pain, and the kind of fright that one meets as an old friend in the middle of the night, when shadows are the only companion you'll have.

"_Some folks, we'll never forget. Some kinds we never forgive. Haven't seen the end of me yet."_

She sang with a determination that was infused with a regret that hung heavily in her voice. It was a confusing line of a song he'd never heard, and he didn't know what to make of it. He shot his gaze to Dean, who made a gesture to indicate that he had no idea what the hell was going on either. He backed away from the door so that she could enter, and she passed him, flinching when her sleeve brushed across him. "Hey, Denna," Sam asked quickly, reaching out _unthinkingly_ to touch her arm. Her hand snapped out and caught at his, twisting it away from her, and her other went to a pressure point on his neck that had him on his knees in front of her before any of them could blink. Dean was surging forward when Sam saw Denna's face change from fear and anger to horror as she realized what she'd done. She released him, and backed away so abruptly that she tripped over the leather sheath-strap that dangled from her hand and fell hard against the floor. She scrambled backwards away from him until her back was met with the side of one of the four twin-sized beds that took up most of the front of the room. They knelt on their respective sides of the room and gazed at each other, the one in confusion, the other in regret and fear, with Dean standing above them, looking confused as to what he was supposed to do. On the one hand, his brother had been attacked. On the other, the traumatized female on his floor.

Family won out when he bent to give Sammy a hand up to his feet, then watched him move over to kneel at a cautious distance from said female and start making murmur-y noises. Sam was good at that. Dean was good at something else entirely. "I'm gonna…" He gestured vaguely to the still-open door. "...beer." Here he was gifted with a disapproving Sam-stare. He bore up under the weight and subtly jerked his thumb at Denna, then at his brother. That same thumb turned to point to himself with eyebrows lifted to the sky.

_Good point._ He got a nod, and continued out the door, closing it behind him.

Sam turned his attention back to Denna, now trembling on the floor as she watched him. He shifted, as non-threateningly as possible, so that he sat Indian-style next to her against the bed, with a respectful gap between them.

"Dean's go-to method of dealing with a problem is to throw booze at it." He told her mildly, rolling his eyes, half-exasperated, half-affectionate.

"He'll probably bring back several kinds of alcohol, and ply you with it." He tossed her a grin. "I'm almost 90% sure that the giving of booze is his love language." He caught the answering smile, little as it was, and took encouragement from it.

"When he came back from Purgatory, he had some trouble adjusting," Sam found himself telling her, hoping she would find a grain of familiarity to relate to that could make it any easier. "He had nightmares, and screamed in his sleep, although he doesn't think I know. All this time, and he's still protecting me, even from himself. He still has them. We both do. You don't do what we do without them, right?" Sam didn't wait for an answer; it was moot.

"Anyways, I don't think Purgatory has its claws in him anymore, or at least, not as deeply. You know what will never let him go, though?" He waited for an inquiring tilt of her head that was so like Castiel's that Sam was sure she'd learned it from him. "Hell. I've seen my brother come out of a lot of stuff, but Hell was the worst. And I feel like shit that I wasn't there for him more, or better, or whatever, when he got back. I was already kind of addicted to Ruby. Then the Apocolypse hit, and other stuff happened. Any ways, this one time, right after he got back, we were in a motel room, kinda like this one, and I reached over him for something, and the next thing I knew, he had shoved away from the table, and was on the floor with his hands over his head, like he thought I was going to hit him. It's the one time he has ever reacted that way. I've surprised him since, and he's hit me, pulled a gun on me. And I've done the same to him. We know that it's an accident, and that we wouldn't ever actually hurt each other, unless it was for our own good. But that one thing, I will never forget. I will never forget the sight of my big brother curled up on the floor, thinking I was going to hurt him. It's the stuff that sticks with you, I guess."

Sam huffed a sigh, and fell silent, the weight of his own memory impressing itself upon him. Denna had stopped trembling, and was sitting the same way he was, wisps of dark hair falling to frame her angular face.

"Denna?" Sam said, in a tone that held finality. She tore her gaze from the folded hands laying in her lap to look up and over at him, caution in her dark blue eyes.

"I have killed people. Women. Innocents. I'm not going to lie to you about that. Dean and I are not exactly safe people to be around. But I can promise you this: unless you try to hurt my brother, I will never raise a hand to you. I will never hurt you, nor cause you to be harmed. You are completely safe with me. If you forget where you are, and who you're with, I won't judge or fault you for it. And I certainly won't retaliate towards you for it." He sat and watched as she realized he was telling the truth. She looked back up at him, with determination vibrating every single one of her cells.

"I'll hold you to that." She said to him.

Her voice was unexpected, a simple sentence more so. He was shocked by both, and by the Scotland running through her words. Her voice was deep, for a woman, and seemed to thrum a little in the close room. It wasn't thick though, and it was musical. Her singing voice had been high and lilting, even when she was fatigued, and her 'normal' tone matched it in, in that it had music threaded through every syllable even though she had spoken no song.

Sam was, understandably, shocked. He wanted to encourage her to continue speaking, but was unsure how to do so without scaring her back to puzzling lyrics. He decided a casual approach was best, and let a few breaths pass before he asked, "When did you learn Sign Language?" It was an easy question that bore no weight on it, and he hoped that the mundanity would result in her actually holding a conversation with him. He was rewarded.

"It's part of the angel bit." She answered him, her voice bringing to mind foggy green hills and rainy mornings. "Like Castiel, I understand and can communicate in every language currently spoken. Sign Language is beautiful, and my favorite, but for my own language."

"What language were you raised speaking?" Sam asked carefully, enough, he hoped, not to send her to silence.

"Gaelic, of course. You can stop." She told him with wry amusement in her dry tone.

"Stop what?"

"You're walking on eggshells, lad. Trying no' to scare me back to my more musical answers, I assume. Well, I doona fright easily as that."

"Says the woman who just put me in a headlock." Sam softened his words with an easy grin.

"Fair point well made, indeed. You've the truth of it. I do take fright as easily as that, but no' about somethin' sae small as talking."

"Does this mean that you're going to talk to us now? That you want to?"

"It means, laddo, that I think ye deserve clear communication, considering what my brother's asked ye to do."

"It's no more than what we'd do for anyone who is in trouble, Denna. It's kind of our thing, helping people," Sam reassured her, not wanting her to feel as though she was a burden placed in their hands in the name of a favour to a friend.

"The 'family business'." Denna smirked. "Castiel told me."

"And on Thursdays, we're teddy bear doctors," he deadpanned, surprising a rough laugh out of her, and the look of shock on her face made him a little sad. Like she couldn't believe that she was still capable of laughter.

"What did he tell you?" She asked him, and her voice was small and hesitant.

"Cas told us that you were taken off the street by human traffickers, that they killed your fiancée, and treated you roughly," Sam answered truthfully. She had inclined to give them proper communication out of respect and he wasn't going to reciprocate by treating the obviously strong woman with kid's gloves, no matter how much he might wish too. "He told us that you have severe post-traumatic stress disorder, and that you were having trouble with your reactions in public. That you coming close to being a danger to yourself and to others." Sam didn't sugar-coat it _either_, and didn't lie to her. She deserved the truth from him about this, and he gave it to her.

"Did he tell you that you might have to kill me?"

"What?!" Driven by the need to reassure, he quickly moved so that he was kneeling in front of her. "Denna, no. We aren't going to kill you. Exactly the opposite."

Her head came up and her eyes met his, sharp blue now swirling with gray like storm clouds.

"I am losing my ability to tell what is real." She told him flatly. "I find myself spacing out, not paying attention to the world around me. Because I can't see it properly. I see two worlds, over-lain with each other. One, is the warehouse, and the people in it are there for no other reason but to hurt me. The other is innocuous, human, and non-threatening. I can't tell which one is the dream. If anyone-anyone!-touches me like that, my only reaction is to fight, because I think that they are trying to hurt me. I stabbed my brother!"

Sam flinched at the raw pain in her voice, the tears in her eyes that she would not allow to fall.  
"He came up behind me and touched my shoulder, and I ran him through with my sword before I could see that it was him. If he had been anything less than an angel!" A lesser woman would have started sobbing there, on the floor in the odd little motel room that sat off the highway in whatever state they were in right now. A lesser woman would have broken down. Not this woman, though. She sat with her back ramrod straight, and there were tears, but she was too iron-willed to let them fall. She was angry, at herself, and Sam was aware, in that moment, how much danger Denna was in. He recognized the look in her eyes, had seen it on his brother's face more than once. The self-loathing that lived there was as familiar to him as his favorite gun, or the Impala. Denna genuinely hated herself, genuinely thought that she would be better off dead. Not for herself. There was no self-pity in those stormy eyes. There was rage. She thought that for others to be safe, she should no longer exist. She thought that the world would really, truthfully, be safer without her in it. Sam suspected that the only reason she hadn't already taken her own life was for Cas. She would know, as siblings do, that her death would hurt him. And, as siblings do, she wished for anything but to cause him harm. He knew this just as surely as he knew that there were days that the only reason Dean hadn't eaten his gun was Sam himself.

Carefully, Sam inched forward, and wrapped his arms around Denna. He heard her gasp, didn't know if it was in fear or pain or what, but when she didn't push him away, he didn't let go.

"Your brother loves you." He murmured in her warm brown hair. "He knows that you are hurting, and you don't know how to control yourself. But the last thing he wants is for you to be hurt more. So he asked us to watch over you, and help you through the days when the hurt is too much. It's okay to be in pain, Denna, and it's okay to react to that pain. Dean and I will stand by you, and do what we can to help it get easier to live in your own skin."

Sam knelt there on the carpet, holding a broken woman. After his little speech, she still didn't weep, and didn't hug him back, but Sam counted it a victory when he felt her relax a little, felt her head rest on his shoulder. He tightened his grip on her for a short second, and let her go, pulling back, and resuming his cross-legged seat next to her. No sense in tempting fate, after all.

"So." He said after a while. "Is it football or soccer in Britain? I can never remember."

**Lyrics From: Song of the Lonely Mountain.**

**So, what do you, my loverly readers, think so far of our Den? **


	5. Chapter 5

**To my Twins and my Mags and my beautiful, bitchin' Beta, JazMitch. **

**My Dear Readers. I know that this is all very angst-tastic, but without it, it would be fluff, and Wraith-fluff should not under any circumstances ever happen. It's good for you, and I promise that we will eventually quit the Woods of Angst, and frolic in the Fields of Happyness. **

Chapter 5

He would not deny the smug feeling that blossomed in his chest at her little giggle. "It's football," she told him with a small smile relaxing her features. "But either road, it's a horrible game, as games go."

Soon thereafter, Dean walked in to hear Sam telling Denna about the time that Dean had tried playing soccer when they were kids, and the bloody nose that had prompted his standing vow to never, ever, play anything involving his head, a stupidly colored ball, and pointlessly sharp shoes.

"Soccer is terrible game," Dean defended, feigning insult, while inwardly pleased at the relaxed setting they had established. He turned his back on his companions, setting a six pack and two bottles of whiskey on the table.

"Aye, it is that," Denna spoke to his back. "We are in complete agreement there."

Dean looked around the room, surprised, for the source of the brogue-heavy voice. His piercing green orbs fell on Denna, who was looking up at him impishly, and he asked, only half-joking; "Was that you, or have I finally lost it?"

"I'm sure that if you were to be gone 'round the bend, t'would take more than just a few words of mine tae put ye there," she answered, nodding very seriously and giving off such a distinct air that reminded them so much of Cas, the Winchesters had to be amazed at the power of sibling relationships.

"W'll...Hi, Den."

She waved to him with a tiny smile. "Hello, Dean."

"Scotland, huh? Y'know, the King of Hell is from there."

"That smarmy bastard may be no' a Lowlander, but he's a Portsman besides. I come from good, strong, Highlander stock wi' me feet firmly in the mountains, and I'll thank ye no' tae forget it," she retorted, her voice not anger-laden, rather just firm in her desire to maintain her stance. Dean nodded in agreement.

"I'll be sure not to. Drink?"

"Love one." She waited until he handed her a whiskey bottle and a shot glass, and had lifted a beer bottle to his mouth. "Sam tells me that the giving of alcohol is how you express affection or devotion, and Castiel's observations seem to cement the theory."

She was rewarded with Dean spitting out his mouthful and dropping his bottle to the carpeted floor.

"This is why we don't have nice things, you gigantic butthead." He glared at his laughing brother, who dismissed the barbed remark with a wave of his hand as Dean bent to clean up his mess.

"Den," he declared firmly, "my love language, is I don't have one. Don't listen to Sam."  
"As you say." She agreed somberly under his gimlet stare.

The rest of the night went easily. Too easily, if they had thought about it, but of course, they hadn't. They, as hunters are wont to do, took the opportunity of a quiet, hunt-less night, good booze, and company to relax and pretend that their problems wouldn't be waiting for them in the morning.

Quiet nights can be so fickle.

Eventually, Denna pulled herself from the floor and said she was going to bed.

She changed, crawled into bed and pulled the covers up, turned off her light and was still.

Sam dimmed the lights throughout the rest of the room, and rejoined his brother on Dean's bed and they conversed quietly about tiny sundries until they were sure Denna was asleep.

"Dean, Denna is in some serious trouble."

Dean cast his eyes over to the sleeping form of the young woman across the room from them. The quiet light that met with darkness on her side of the room cast shadows on the bit of her face peeping out from the blankets. She lay quiet and still, with the relaxed sag to her muscles that spoke of one deeply asleep.

"What did she say to you?" Dean asked.

"It's what she wasn't saying that worries me the most. She thinks Cas put her with us because we might have to kill her."

"That's completely turned around." Dean protested, irritation bubbling in him on his friend's behalf. "That is precisely the_ opposite_ of why Cas asked us to keep an eye on her."

"I know. She's angry, Dean. She's angry, and she thinks she needs to die." Sam cut his eyes briefly to his older brother_**. **_"Sound like anyone you know?"

Dean glared over at him, stung by the reminder. "Yeah, you know what? It's familiar. But don't do that, Sam, don't throw that at me." Dean's eyes_**, **_in being shuttered, spoke volumes about the hurt that surfaced at Sam's admittedly harsh words. Sam winced in guilt at the expression, softening.

"Okay...I'm sorry. But, Dean? She's pretty close to suicidal. I'm not sure what to say to her to reassure her. To tell she's going to be okay. Because, y'know, we know better than anyone that it isn't always gonna _be_ okay." Sam let out a small sigh, worry rolling off him.  
"Also, she's a girl," Dean added, nodding. "I mean, with a guy, you hand him a beer, punch his shoulder, and tell him to suck it up for as long as he can, and when he falls apart, hand him another beer. But then again, look what that did to Dad."

They sat in silence, rolling mostly empty beer bottles in their hands, looking at anything but the unmoving lump of blankets across the room. Then Sam looked up and asked, "What if we brought Charlie in? Maybe it would be easier for Denna to talk to a girl, and Charlie's not exactly squeamish."  
"That's a good plan. I'll call her in the morning, see if she'd come up from where ever it is she's causing trouble now. I-"

Both dark heads jerked up, full attention caught by the movement from Denna's bed. Perhaps it was just a nervous flutter, perhaps it was a dream that had her twitching-but perhaps again, she'd heard them. They sat motionless as deer, watching her keenly for another sign that she was awake and heeding them.

The movement that came a few agonizing moments later spoke of nightmares. Her head moved on the pillow, her hands dislodged the blanket enough that they could her face twisted in fear. "Should we wake her up?" Sam asked uncertainly, pity lancing through him. He knew the battle with nightmares, fought them regularly, and he knew what a difficult one it could be.

"Yes." Dean's answer was decisive when he heard her make a tiny mewling noise full of terror. They started to their feet, and then were hurried along when they saw her hand grab the knife off her bedside stand and flash towards her gauze-covered arm. They weren't fast enough to stop the first cut that skidded off her arm and across her chest, but before she could bring it down again, Dean's big hands clamped around hers and plucked the knife away. She fought him, still locked in the nightmare, and Sam as well when he tried to grab her injured arm to keep her from tearing her stitches. She fought them hard, with strength born of fear and pain and angelic birthright. It took them what seemed like forever, but was probably only bare minutes, to wrestle her flailing arms and legs to relative stillness on the bed, with Dean wrapped around her upper body, holding her arms strait-jacket-style from behind her, and Sam sitting on her legs. Slowly, she stopped fighting them. It took an agonizing length of time before she was still, and even so her limbs would still twitch in their human bonds, but eventually, she was one again dead asleep.

Dean sent Sam out to the car for some kind of rope to tie her hands, because they couldn't trust that she wouldn't try again. She, or whomever she was fighting in the dream. He came back quickly with soft leather medical cuffs that had been buried and forgotten in the trunk since they'd been needed for Sam himself when he'd been addicted to demon blood. Carefully, Dean eased off the bed, slowly letting go his gentle but implacable grip on Denna's hands. They buckled the cuffs around her wrists and secured them to the bed frame, thankful that it was an old fashioned bed with posters and a headboard at the top. Sitting on her left, Sam opened the first aid kit he'd also retrieved, and began a careful task of cleaning Denna's wounds and fixing the bandage, with Dean, after efficiently frisking her for more knives, standing vigilant behind him. He'd finished her arm, and was navigating her shirt as best he could to dress the cut on her upper chest without cutting the fabric, when Dean suddenly spoke from behind him.

"Sammy."

He looked up, and was met by Denna's wakeful blue eyes that were imbued with the most heart-wrenching look of defeat as she watched Sam, who immediately reached to release the cuffs.

"Leave them." She ordered in a tone that brooked no argument, and Sam complied, wordlessly finishing his task, taping gauze over the cut and re-ordering her shirt.

"Do you want to tell us what happened?" Dean asked, making the question an order with a talent born from years of questioning townsfolk.

"It will keep for the morning. These things are better left for daylight. You two should go back to bed-I've kept you long enough." Sam could hear loud as bells the effort Denna was making to keep her voice as calm and emotionless as Dean's, and failing.

"I don't think-"

"Dean." Sam cut his brother off. He heard, even if Dean didn't, the raw pain in Denna's words and the valiant struggle she was putting up to keep it in until the lights were out and she had some modicum of privacy. "Tomorrow is good enough." He stood up and gestured to the cuffs, and was unsurprised when she told him once more to leave them where they were.

"Okay, Denna."

He untwisted the blanket that was all contorted by the struggle and pulled them over her. "Alright?" He didn't expect an answer, and didn't get one. He set the med kit on the table with his computer and when Dean opened his mouth to ask him something, Sam shook his head, making a gesture for silence. He jerked his head at Dean's bed, and made sure his brother was in it before he snapped off the light. He sat on the edge of his own and shucked off his shoes, listening to his actions being mirrored a pair of feet away. Tonight there was no light mannered joshing about the stink and size of the discarded shoes, only the soft sound of fabric moving over fabric as the two men settled on their respective beds, and lay their heads for sleep.

Sam lay in his bed, angled so that both his head and his feet were somewhat on the little twin mattress, and listened for the sleep sounds Dean would make. Dean always fell asleep silently, with only a difference in his breathing to tell that was no longer conscious. When he'd gotten there, however, he'd make these waffling breaths that had always struck him as like those of a little kid, and often teased him for.

He lay there a long time, listening to Dean sleep, and listening for the change in breath that would tell him Denna was there too; but the only sound from the other side of the room he heard was that of misery.

Eventually, a whisper reached him.

"Sam?"

Sam swung his feet over the edge of the bed and soundlessly moved across the room to Denna, reaching out to touch one of her bound hands to let her know he was there.

"What do you need?" He whispered softly, loath to break the soft darkness with a normal tone.

Her answer was hesitant in coming. "Please...would you-" She gave up and then there was just, "please." sent out to the darkness, a broken little whisper that held so much hurt. Hoping he was interpreting her correctly, he sat, then lay, down next to her over the blanket she lay under, his chest to her back, not touching her over much but for the palm he lay on her side. "It's going to be okay, Denna. You aren't alone anymore."

That was it. It was like something broke in the night, and the lithe body next to him began to shake with gut-wrenching, soundless tears. He eased forward a bit, and gently held her as she sobbed in the darkness, her hurt finally given vent with the tears. "It's going to be okay." He murmured again. "I promise not to leave you alone."

When finally she quieted, he moved to leave the bed, to let her sleep in peace, but was stopped with a ragged "please stay," that he was wasn't sure he heard until she said again, "Please?"

"Okay." he relented. "I'll stay."

Eventually, they both finally succumbed to deep, dreamless sleep.

**Okays. Basically, this is me begging for attention. If your reading this, and you like it, or you have feedback, please leave a comment. I thrive off your thoughts, ideas, and opinions of what I am doing to our characters, and this is my first SPN-fic. I'd like to hear that no-one is mad, at least. Okey-dokey. I'm done now. I promise you get more soon. Love you all, bye!**


	6. Chapter 6

**As always and as ever, all of my love and adoration to my Beautiful, Bitchin' Beta, JazMitch. No, seriously guys, go read her stuff. **

.

Chapter 6

Sam came awake without warning, without really even knowing what had awakened him. He knew from instincts honed by years of peril that he wasn't in any immediate danger, so he took stock of where, in fact, he was.

Which happened to be Denna's bed.

He was warm, contented, and wrapped around a pliant, comfortable body that smelled nice and was soft under his hand. And...shit...he was actually wrapped around her. He was laying on his right side, curved around Denna, who lay facing him, her face relaxed in sleep, thick brown lashes brushing the dark circles under her closed eyes. His left arm was draped over her side, his hand resting on her lower back, and one of his long legs lay over hers and the comforter. He was still over the blanket, and she still under it, but regardless of the semantics, still felt rather...intimate, and he hoped very much that he hadn't overstepped his boundaries. He glanced at the ugly clock that squat on the nightstand on Denna's other side, between the two beds. It was almost 7:30. He rolled carefully out of Denna's bed and met Dean's stare from where he stood leaning in the doorway of the bathroom. A slew of emotions ranging from bashful embarrassment to indignant protest smacked him and he reacted instinctively.

"This isn't what it looks like." His hands went up, palms out as if to defend himself.

"I didn't think it was." Dean said calmly, his gaze and voice steady and matter-of-fact.

"What?" He was surprised, but admittedly relieved by the lack of heat in Dean's voice.

"See, it _looks_ like you were taking advantage of a girl we were asked to take care of, a girl conveniently tied to her bed," Dean shrugged, pushing off the doorway and stepping further into the room, casually rubbing a hand through short brown hair still mussed from sleep. "So, considering the fact that that sounds more like me and not you, it's probably not what it looks like. Wanna tell me what it is?"

Sam, confident now that his brother wasn't mad at him, moved across the room to sit on his own bed.

"She was having trouble getting back to sleep," Sam explained, "and she was hurting. I just went over so that she wouldn't feel like she was alone. I figured that she's had enough of that. After she was calmed down, I was going to leave, but she asked me to stay until she fell asleep. I kinda fell asleep with her."

Dean gestured to the still-sleeping Denna. "She gonna say the same thing?"

"Dean!"

"Hey, man, I'm just checking. I don't want her brother smiting your ass, no matter how good of friends we are."

"I just wanted her to feel like she wasn't alone, Dean. Nothing else." Sam defended, fast becoming rather irritated with his brother for failing to see the purity of his motives.

"Okay…" Dean nodded slowly, showing his trust in his brother with a wordless tilt of his lips and an unwavering lock of their eyes. Once he was satisfied he'd gotten his point across, his eyes took on a mischievous glint. "You sleep good?" He smirked, one last teasing rejoinder for his brother, who, instead of blushing and ignoring him, met his eyes and said calmly, "I did, actually. You?"

Dean was the one who turned away and muttered unintelligible nonsense this time, while Sam

grinned at him.

"I'm going to find breakfast." Sam decided. "You wanna keep an eye on Denna?"

"Yeah. Fine."

Sam pocketed his wallet and shrugged into a flannel button down. The early fall mornings were starting to get a little chilly as September neared October.

He sent one last look towards the girl sleeping in the corner, and then he was gone.

It was cliché, but Denna came awake slowly. She gradually became aware of her body and becoming aware of each other. She was warm, and her limbs were heavy with a continued exhaustion that had nothing to do with physical exertion. Or maybe it was. She had not slept easily last night, and when she had awakened, it was with quiet panic. Her hands had been tied, and there was a weight on her bed that was more than her own. Her eyes had flown open ready to scream, and she'd seen Sam, big hands gently cleaning a cut that burned on her shoulder. She'd looked around, seen Dean quietly watching them, heard him speak his brother's name.

Sam had wanted to release her.

He didn't get how stupid that was. He just didn't understand how dangerous she could be when she didn't know who she was. She could hurt him, hurt Dean, and in hurting them, her brother as well. She didn't want that, beyond anything. Their willingness to help and their easy, loving natures was endearing, even to her, who never found many people worth any sort of time or effort.

She liked them, the mad Winchester boys, and did not want to see them come to harm, by her hands, by any hands.

By the time her body caught up to her mind, and she was awake, she was no longer comfortably languid, but too hot, and her muscles were tingling from being so still. She shifted and moved to rise, but only got so far before the metal chasing of her wrist cuffs jangled hollowly on the wood of the bed posts. She experienced a tiny moment of panic, and then relief as she realized that not only was she safe, so were the people around her. She could not have gotten up in the middle of the night and sleep-walked her way through a killing spree. She realized as she tried to maneuver her hands to free them that she hadn't slept more soundly since before the warehouse, since she'd realized that she was losing her mind. She had slept well this past night. She had been secure, and had not been alone.

Sam had stayed with her all night, she knew by the fading warmth on the other side of the bed, and slept watch over her. She was filled with a bursting of gratitude towards him that was set aside by a current frustration. Her hands were just too damned far apart for her to get them off.

"Want some help?" Dean's voice came from across the room, and she startled a little, having forgotten to see if there were other people in the room.

"Please." She answered him, recovering herself.

"You alright?" He asked her, releasing her right wrist, then moved around the bed to do the other.

"I am, thank you." She slid out of the bed, her loose sleep pants rucking up around her knees, and regretted it immediately before dismissing it bitterly as something that she now had no control over.

She felt more than saw Dean's reaction to her legs. In fact he probably had had no outward reaction. But she felt it, all the same-a sudden stillness in the room brought on by something

shocking that you don't know how to deal with right away.

She knew what they, her legs, looked like. She knew what Dean saw, and was struck to momentary stillness by.

If they had just been legs, normal girl legs, he probably would never noticed them beyond that they were attached to the rest of her. If they had simply been normal hunter legs, muscled with perhaps a few scars to tell stories about, he would have noticed even less.

But, life could never be simple, for fear of being boring.

Her legs, and the rest of her body for that matter, were not simply scarred from the rigors of hunter life, or from minor torture in the warehouse. Her legs were _hideously_ scarred. They had been _carved_ into, burned, and damnably decorated. There were obscene words carved into her skin, demonic patterns that traced almost lovingly across it, and random, unthinking violence to add spice, as if the rest weren't enough. There was enough of her own untouched skin to make the scars stand out, glaring and garish.

She hurried the rest of the off the bed and shook her pants into place so that she was once more covered.

Her head went up and shoulders squared so that she could meet Dean's gaze, just an inch or two above her own. There was sympathy and regret in eyes green as her homeland's mountains, but the man made no statement to the effect towards her, and said only, "You want some coffee? Sam'll be back soon with breakfast."

Nodding gratefully, she moved over to the complimentary coffee pot he indicated and poured the noxious smelling motel brew into a cup.

"It's disgusting." Dean commented grinning lightly, "but it's coffee."

She sipped the steaming black liquid and made an exaggerated eye roll heavenwards.

"Ambrrrrosia." She drew out the word, her accent thickened, rolling the 'r' out, Scots-style, resulting in Dean's answering chuckle.

"There isn't a whole hell of a lot of back-up in you, is there, Den?" he grinned as she poured a dollop of last night's whiskey into the cup to join the coffee.

"Hells bells, man, I'm a Scot. My ancestors would hae' eaten rocks, and sworne to ye that they'd never tasted better," she informed him calmly.

"That so?"

"It is indeed." Denna was saved from making informative Scottish small-talk when Sam walked in, carrying a fast-food bag and a flat of Kwik-Trip coffee.

"Oh, _bheannaigh tu_!" Denna exclaimed, setting aside her cup and accepting the one Sam extended to her.

"I knew you were faking," Dean teased her, donning that irascible smirk as he accepted his own brown cup from his brother.

"I was not," Denna declared roundly. "I was simply utilizing the resources I had at my command. Now I have better resources, and the previous one becomes obsolete." With the air of one who has proven herself right to her own satisfaction, she drank gratefully and with high confidence.

Sam laughed at their byplay, inwardly rejoicing at Denna's easy smile and quick rejoinders to Dean's joshing. "Hey, what was that you said? Vay-naggy something?" Sam knew he was

butchering the Gaelic, but it was nothing like Latin, or German, and he imagined that it was spelled in an exceedingly confusing manner.

"_Bheannaigh tu._ Vay-na-gay too," Denna corrected him. "It means 'bless you'. It's a pretty common saying in Scotland, especially among the Papists, as we're called."

"We?"

"Catholics. I'm a practicing Roman Catholic. Dinna assume that fashed mug, Dean, lad! Catholics are to thank for those handy wee exorcisms you boys are so fond of, among all kinds of other helpful bits and bobs you take for granted."

"Wow, your accent got thick." Dean ignored, for the most part, her protest over the disdainful face he'd made when she'd mentioned her religion. She knew he was avoiding an argument, knew it by the reflexive set of Sam's jaw, and the quiet regret that still sat behind Dean's eyes.

"Say something else in Gaelic. It's cool," he told her, extending a premature olive branch with a smile.

Jaw hardening a little, she looked him square in the eye, and said, "_Mi fiosraich tu dhiarc mo athailta."_ I know you saw my scars. "_Mi'a ni tua do ri gabli truas." _I am not yours to pity.

"I really hope you didn't just like, insult my parentage or something." The tone was light-hearted, but the body-language was wary.

She softened her gaze. "Nay, lad. I just asked ye what ye wanted me to say. It's Gaelic for you-it all sounds like singing or swearing. Usually both. It's why I love it so."

"Okay, so what does actual swearing sound like?" Dean persisted.

"I'm no' teaching ye naughty words in my language.''

"Aw, why not?" The childish pout that came on to the man's face removed the last of the sting from his previous moue of disgust over her religion.

"For one, you'd mangle it, offend me, and I'd have to wipe the floor with ye." She told him baldly.

Dean's cocky smirk was knee-jerk, as was his claim that she could try anytime she wished.

Sam decided that enough was enough, and started doling out food. For the next little bit, mouths were more occupied with chewing than with potentially insulting each other.

For a girl who had only started actually talking last night, Denna certainly had a way of turning a phrase, and Sam worried that Dean, having no one to spar with but himself and sometimes Cas or Crowley, if the Demon King showed up, would begin to react unkindly to someone who could match him stroke for stroke. His brother was not exactly a patient man, and Sam didn't want to find out which of the two of them was a better fighter. Not yet, anyways.

Packing took only a very short time, and was achieved without bloodshed. Dean and Sam were both amazed with Denna's turn in attitude. She still reacted strangely when either of them came near enough to touch her, and still flinched when they did end up touching her. But in amongst that, she talked with them, even smiled or laughed sometimes. When she decided to open up, apparently she really decided to open up. Sam still got the feeling, though, that the more she spoke, the less she was saying or revealing. The snippets of song had been slightly vague, but they got her point across. They couldn't help but be honest. Speaking plainly, it seemed like she was able to cloud that point, and he didn't even really know if she was doing it on purpose, or really thought that she was making more sense.

They had agreed that yesterday as a trial run had kind of flopped, and randomly finding excuses

to touch her without talking to her first was probably more harmful than it would help in the long run, and they intended to have a 'talk' on the subject with her and Kevin when they got back to the bunker. Dean had called him to let him know that they'd be bringing home another addition to their motley crew, and to start cleaning out one of the other bedrooms. It wouldn't be ready by the time they got there, but since Kevin's main job right now, since it was the so-called 'peace times', was helping Sam catalog the Men of Letters' immense library that sprawled throughout the entire bunker, with no ascertainable referencing system that they could find yet. It made Bobby's old collection of books seem paltry in comparison.

They loaded up the Impala, and Denna slipped a thick book out of her duffle before slipping into the seat behind Sam as Dean slammed the trunk shut, making the shiny black car rock forward a bit on it's shocks.

He swung into the driver's seat and Sam flipped open his map, and they were off, with no plans to stop for wizards.

The day streamed past them with patterns of the sun and shade and brightly turning leaves playing along the road and in the car. They stopped once for food and bathrooms and to refuel the car, Sam running into the convenience store that sat next to the surprisingly clean gas station for munchables and bottles of water and Coke as Dean pumped gas into the car. Denna, banishing thoughts of self-consciousness, danced a quick martial arts move to stretch out her stiff muscles, Dean watching on in frank appreciation.

"Hey, what was that?" He asked when she stepped back to the car.

"Tai Chi. It's my favorite art without my sword."

"I've seen Tai Chi." Dean told her baldly. "It's a little old ladies in the park deal. That was some serious kung-fu shit."

Denna sighed and rubbed her forehead. "Kung-fu is more a mindset, and an understanding of the things around ye. You use the idea of kung-fu in basically every martial art. Tai Chi is an art of martial defense, and one of grounding. With it, a tiny woman can avoid and defend herself from a large man, or the other road around. Lots of people use it."

"I get the feeling that you've had to give that speech a lot."

"My Da would tease me horribly when I was first learning. Told me I was too tall and too Scottish for Tai Chi. I'd have to educate him every time I practiced. Took me forever to just reconcile the fact that he was having me on."

Dean doubled over in laughter at her last words, and laughed harder at her bemused look. "Having you on means something way different in the states than it does in Britain, apparently."

"Dean, leave the poor girl alone." Sam came up behind them, long-legged strides eating up the distance, grin first.

Insults shared, Impala and bodies fueled, they all piled back into the car, went on their way.

They drove forever.

Dean drove, Sam and Denna read, and music played softly, Metallica guitars riffing quietly in the front.

Denna slept, Dean drove, and Sam read.

Sam slept, Denna read, and Dean drove, listening to that same tape again.


	7. Chapter 7

**As always, and as ever, thanks muchly to my beautiful, bitchin' Beta, JazMitch. You rock, sweetz!**

**As for the rest of you, whom also rock, I realized I was using a lot of Scottish idioms and mannerisms of speech that can get confusing, so I included a dictionary at the end of the Chapter for your useage. Thanks all!**

Chapter 7

Eventually, night fell, and Dean pulled over. "Okay, you two," he said, yawning. "Switch." He got

out, followed by Sam, and Dean gestured for Denna to sit up front. "Keep Sammy awake for me, huh, Den? I'm bushed." He promptly stretched out in the back seat and fell asleep.

Denna admired the unspoken communication skills between the brothers. They had, without speaking, agreed to just keep driving until they got home, keeping her awake for at least part of the night.

Sam pulled away from the shoulder of a road in the middle of nowhere, and flipped through the radio until he found a country station. The station's jingle played (_95.3 _NASH_, the nation's best country!_), and 'You and Tequila" played. After a few measures of the song, Denna sang along, pure contralto quietly sent into the night.

"_You and tequila make me crazy. You're like poison in my blood! One more night could kill me, baby. One is one too many, one more is never enough…"_

Sam listened to her voice blend smoothly with the soft Southern tenor, singing harmony to his melody, until the song was over.

"You have a beautiful voice, Denna," he complimented her with a smile.

She thanked him, a little shyly. "I used to think that it was the angel thing, because of the harps and all, but Castiel told me that angels don't actually do that."

"Nope," Sam snorted."In our experience, angels are more homicidal, and less dulcet. Kind of a let-down, isn't it?" Sam said dryly, resisting the urge to roll his eyes.

"A little, I suppose," she allowed, cocking her head thoughtfully to the side. "But then, our heroes are always less shiny and bright than we want them to be. Sometimes the knight in shining armor is an alcoholic, and sometimes the Paragon of Virtue has a nasty mouth. Sometimes the superhero is just a man that fate dropped into a load of trouble. You and Dean, for instance. The monsters whisper your name in the dark, and tell their children that if they don't behave, you'll come to take them away. You are feared and respected, and only bragged about when that monster is feeling particularly stupid or drunk. The people ye have saved tell stories about the time ye rushed in to save the day, and ye are built up as these rugged, plaid-clad knights who can lose no battles. Would ye agree with that projection of yourself?" she asked him frankly, as though she already knew the answer.

"No." Sam agreed. "Me and Dean are just guys. Scary guys, but just men. Dean drinks every night to help him sleep, and I brood all over the place. I was an addict. We started the Apocalypse. Sure, we finished it too, but people get hurt because of us." Sam's quiet tone was awash with unspoken regrets, yet still strong in his belief that they had done what they could under the circumstances.

"I don't know if this would comfort or anger ye-," Denna shrugged, "but people will never remember that. They will dismiss the demon blood, wave aside the alcohol. Girls will fawn because Dean is a 'tortured soul', and you are tall and broodsome. Mysterious. That's how they will remember ye."

"Because of the books?"

"Aye, just so. Because of the books, and the stories people tell."

"That is fucked up." Sam remarked baldly, having a rare moment of vulgarity that just bubbled up.

"Perhaps it is. But, that's people for ye. You and your brother crawled out of Hell itself, boyo. For the sake of each other, ye both hae walked there willingly. That is why people will forgive much of ye. Brotherly nobility. It wins a lot of respect these days."

"That's just family. I-"

"Nay, it's not. It should be. But it's not. There is a girl sleeping in her car right now because her mother wilna let her sleep at home. There is a lad dealing drugs on a corner because his da

needs him to make rent money. Family has become a byword for people to be ashamed of. It used to mean the ones that would fight by your side, and always welcome ye home. The stories of ye and you brother remind people of those days, that werena so long ago atall."

Sam was silent for a time, digesting this information slowly. The cool night air swept past them as soft fiddle music filled the car. He was filled with a new appreciation of what Dean had always taught him about family; a new appreciation of the fact that he had something with his brother that most people didn't.

"How do you know all of this? About the people and monsters that tell stories?"

"I can go a lot of places other hunters can't. They talk, I listen. Castiel tells me some things, the books told me others."

"You read those damn things?" Sam asked incredulously.

"Of course I did," Denna replied unabashedly. "Fairs fair, is it no'? My brother told ye about my past. Should I no ken about yours?"

"I guess." Sam allowed with a grin.

They sat for a long time, saying nothing more. Denna sang softly along with the radio, sometimes just snatches of the song, sometimes the whole thing. Sam just listened to her, listening to the inflections of her tone, the emphasis she put on some verses, and not on others. He was able now, as he had not been before, to appreciate the beautiful purity of her voice. It had been harder when he was trying to decipher the meaning in the song that she was singing, but now that her voice was softly raised only for her own pleasure, he could acknowledge everything he'd been missing.

Sam drove, and Denna sang as they left Illinois and moved through Missouri. They talked of little things when she flipped through the radio and couldn't find a station that came through nicely enough to let play. She eventually gave up, and they just talked. Nothings, and niceties, little stories, what kind of music they liked, books they'd both read. This killed much of the time that was spent skimming through the top of Missouri and into Kansas, hugging the Nebraska border. She felt Sam's body language change, and knew that they were close to the brothers' home. They drove through a tiny town called Lebanon, and Sam stopped talking, a taste of anticipation filling the car, rubbing off on Denna, and she twitched kind of nervously almost the whole rest of the way home.

Soon, very soon, Sam steered the black vehicle onto a gravel driveway that was nearly hidden by bushes and trees and general green over-growth. The minute the car was stopped, and he maneuvered himself out of it, slamming the door, Dean was stretching awake, mumbling something about "Clean 'er out 'amorrow..."

He stumbled out of his seat, and meandered away from his car.

"Dean." Sam called his brother back.

"Mmph?" The groggy grunt was indifferent, and a little amusing.

"Door's the other way, brother."

"Oh."Dean swung about, adjusted his course and slogged sleepily towards the little door carved into the hill. He bumped into his car, and slurring, apologized. "Sorry, Baby.'' Four feet later, he promptly crashed right into the closed door that led into his home. "Mean'ta do that. Mmhm." He mumbled to himself. Taking pity on his brother, Sam opened the door and lead Dean down the stairs to his room. Denna trailed after them, stopping in the library before the corridor that lead to the bedrooms. There were so many books! She scanned the titles, and marveled at the age and thoroughness of the collection as she listened to Sam close Dean's door and stride back down the corridor toward her.

"Your room isn't quite cleared up just yet," he said, tiredly tugging a hand the size of a dinner plate through long hair. "But if you don't mind, I can set you up on the couch. It's not much, but it's comfortable. Dean sleeps on it enough. Good enough?"

She nodded her acquiescence, and Sam led her to an alcove tucked away behind stacks and shelves of old books that was decked out with a long, ugly green couch, and a huge shelf of movies that flanked a large screened television. He pulled a big, old quilt and a pillow from a cedar chest that sat behind the deliciously ugly, squat sofa. He handed her both, and asked her if she needed anything else. He was literally weaving on his feet, fighting to keep his eyes open.

She smiled, and said, "Get to your bed, lad. Ye'll be dead on your feet in another minute, do ye

no' sleep."

It was a testament to the truth she spoke when he didn't even argue, just said goodnight and plodded to his bed room, as zombie-like as the sleepwalking Dean.

Denna...Denna just stood there for a while, eyes changed from warm and open, had gone hard as flint at his absence, hugging the quilt to her chest, duffle bag hanging from one shoulder, and her sword slung over the other. It was all she had left in the world. She still didn't know how a bomb had gotten onto the bottom of her car a few mornings ago, or who put it there, but she assumed it was a human hunter. Most of them didn't like her, or felt there was something wrong about her. There were five or six of them that kind of quietly tried to kill her anytime she wandered into their 'territory'. Maine _was_ awfully close to Simon Corrells' hunting ground, but the last time he'd tried to kill her, Castiel had explained, politely and in grand detail, why he really shouldn't do that anymore. And since then, they'd kinda just left each other alone.

Denna shook her musings off and drew in a heavy breath. She still had several outfits, and most of her books. The really important ones, anyroad. She still had her life, whatever that was worth, and sundries that were important enough keep close to her. She dropped her armful on the couch and slipped her Rosary from its special little pocket on her sword's sheath. It had, along with her weapon, been a gift from Castiel. He'd never said, but she thought he'd made it himself. She wrapped herself in the blanket, suddenly cold beyond belief and curled into a corner of the couch. She weighed her beads in her palm, fingered them, then raised her right hand and crossed herself, kissed the heavy silver crucifix. There would be no sleep for her tonight. The very idea terrified her. No. Tonight was for silence and prayer, surrounded by the legacy of men who'd thought to defend the world from evil.

She began her prayer in the language that still came the most natural to her for that activity, her quiet voice soft and resonant on the heavy night, made light by the old lamps on the walls, set to their dimmest setting so that shadows played amongst the library.

"_Ta creid an aon Dhia, a Pathair a Uile-chumhachdach…_"

~~~~**The Next Morning**~~~~

Sam and Dean met each other in the hallway coming out of their rooms. "Coffee." Dean shot out at him.

"I smell it too."

"You aren't making it?"

"No, I just got out of bed. Kevin?"

"If he's making coffee, I'm salting and burning that boy's ass," Dean spat, eyes haunted by the memory of that black, black morning-the one time Kevin had ever been allowed to touch the

coffee pot. The brothers shared a moment of silent revulsion, shook it off, and headed down the

corridor to find the source of the scent that assailed their senses with sweet seduction.

Denna was singing in the kitchen.

They hung back to watch her as she...hot damn, the woman was cooking! As they watched, she made a quick-step across the kitchen to the tune she was singing, some old Irish thing.

"_Her eyes, they shone like diamonds! I thought her the queen of the land!_"

Her stockinged feet were light and quick on the slippery old boards of the floor as she danced across them to the tune she sang, spinning briefly in a pirouetting motion. She found what she'd been seeking in the cupboard, a plate, and spun back to the stove, flipping pancakes and bacon onto the ceramic and setting it on the counter.

"Come along, then, lads. Gang in here and dinna gawk at me. It's like ye've no' seen a woman cook before." Her cheeky voice was a far aways from the anger-laden, frightened one they had encountered not so long ago, and it did both brothers good to hear some spunk back in her, even if it was faked.

"It certainly doesn't happen very often." Sam said, crossing to her with a grin, and taking the mug of coffee she handed him, Dean right behind him. He accepted his, tasted it, and clapped Denna's shoulder. "Now THAT is ambrosia."

"In payment, ye can fetch the wee laddie who's been hidin' up the stairs, keekin' at me like Christmas morning. I dinna think he kens what tae make of me."

Both pairs of eyes, green and brown, travelled up the stairs to Kevin's face peeping between the bars of the staircase. He saw them looking up at him and his face, dominated by quizzical eyebrows, disappeared from view.

"Kevin, get down here and say hello!" Dean bellowed, stubbornly not moving, despite Denna's reproachful look in his direction.

Embarrassed at being caught, Kevin slunk slowly down the quiet wooden staircase. He came to stand in front of Denna, and extended his hand to her.

"I'm Kevin Tran." He introduced himself. She graciously accepted his hand, and said,

"And I'm Denna. It's lovely to meet you, Kevin."

"You're gonna have to excuse him, Den." Dean said, slurping his coffee. "The only woman he's ever actually seen besides you is his mom. He's embarrassed."

Seeing Kevin's indignant face, Denna soothed him with a tiny smile, more a lightening of her normally tight features "Dinna fash overmuch, Kevin, lad. There's no shame to being shy around a lass. We like it, ye ken. Makes us feel mysterious." She winked subtly at him, and he grinned, ducking his head.

"Now, gang ye all tae the table, and eat the food I've made ye. I'll be verra, verra fashed wi' ye, do ye let it gang tae waste."

They all sat down to the table, and Denna passed around food and plates and bits and bobs she'd found in the cupboards.

"Ye need tae gang to the shops." She told them. "I've never seen such poorly kept cupboards."

"None of us really cook," Sam explained. "Mostly we have pizza. Or burgers."

"Aye, well, ye've a verra nice cooking range, and I'll na let it gang to disuse. Or do ye have an objection tae proper food?"

"Nope! No objection. Sammy, tell her you have no objection!" Dean insisted, his mouth full of

syrup-drowned pancake, making Denna giggle a bit. Sam agreed with his brother, and promised to take Denna grocery shopping later.

As he was helping her clean up after breakfast-lunch, really-Sam asked about something that had been sitting on his mind for quite some time. "Denna, what's your last name? Cas didn't say, and you didn't add it when you met Kevin."

"Quite right. I didn't." She went pointedly silent as her hands slipped elbow deep into sudsy dish water in the deep ceramic sink.

Sam felt like he should heed her quiet, but he was genuinely curious, and you didn't find monsters by shutting up when witnesses got tetchy.

"Why not?"

"Because it's no longer a part of me. I am not who my parents raised anymore. Craig is dead, and I never got tae take his name. Anyroad, after the warehouse, I would never have been Denna Ferguson anymore either. Your last name is meant to show who your family is, and I have none, but for Castiel, and we never shared names."

"So you're just Denna?" He asked as he took a wet dish from the strainer and began drying it with a clean white towel.

"Denna Marie Katherine Margret. Calling name, saint's name, and my chosen Confirmation names. What else really matters?"

Sam had to concede the fact that she was right, and quietly dried dishes until the companionable silence started to stretch and grow awkward.

"What are Confirmation names?" He asked to alleviate the tensing silence.

"It's a Catholic thing. At aboot 16 years, we'll have our Confirmation to make us adults in the Church, and part of that ritual is to choose a Saint to be our patron, to carry their name and have them pray for us at the feet of Christ. I have two, Saint Katherine and Saint Margret of Scotland. They pray for me."

"Are you sure?" Sam was understandably skeptical.

"Aye, I am. My brother has spoken with them and brought me messages from them once or twice."

"Hmm."

"Even if he hadn't, though, lad, I'd still maintain that they offered for me. It's faith. If I had it not, I'd be less than I am."

The afternoon passed quietly, Denna helping Sam and Kevin to clear out her room down the corridor of doors that held the sleeping quarters.

Sam, however, began to notice that Denna was flagging, slowing in her response times and motions, and after she spoke to him in Gaelic, with the obvious tone of someone who expects to be answered, he sent Kevin out of the room.

"Denna, are you sick?"

"Na, cia fath?" _No, why?_

"I'm going to assume you said no. You aren't speaking English, Denna, and you sound like I

should be understanding you. Are you sure you are alright?"

Denna immediately corrected her speech. "Yes. I'm verra sorry, lad. I'm just verra, verra tired."

"Did you not sleep well?" Concern was evident on the hunter's face, and was amplified by the jaded scoff from the woman he was regarding.

"It's no that I didna sleep well, boyo. It's that I didna sleep."

"At all?" She hadn't slept in 28 hours or more? It wan't a huge thing for Sam or his brother to miss a night of sleep, but they usually made it up somehow the next day, and if they didn't, they quickly became crotchety and short with each other, and extremely jumpy. Denna's only real indication had been that she'd forgotten to speak English.

"Nay." Her answer was short as she snapped a sheet out over her bed and started fitting it to the mattress.

"Why not? Was there something wrong with the couch?"

Denna sighed, but didn't answer until the sheet was on the bed. When her hands stilled and it was obvious that Sam was waiting for an answer, she turned and sat down.

"No. Naught like that. I...was afraid. Tae sleep, that is. Just simple fear."

Sam came to sit next to her. "Afraid because of the dreams?"

"Aye, and what I might do while I'm in them. It's no' just for myself that I fear, but also for the people around me. I dinna wish to wake up one bright morn, and find meself bathin' in the blood of my brother's best friends."

"A valid point." Sam told her. "But Dean and I aren't all that breakable, you know."

"Aye, ye are." Denna disagreed. "Ye're naught but human, for all that ye're great and mighty heroes, lauded in song and in story. Ye are breakable indeed, my lad. And it scares me greatly."

"I feel like the 'great and mighty heroes' thing was unfair." Sam kept his tone light.

"Perhaps." She didn't take it back.

"What would help? You seemed to sleep fairly well after your last nightmare. What made it better?"

She huffed out a derogatory laugh. "It just sounds so debauched to say out loud. I slept aisy when ye tied my hands, and slept next to me in my bed. _Bheatha a Mathair,_ how would I explain it to me mum?"

"Much the same way I explained it to my brother, I expect. With lots of blushing and stuttering."

"Aye," She laughed. "Indeed. I did though. I lay my head aisily down because I kenned that I was bound, couldna harm anyone, and none could harm me in turn, because you were right there."

"You didn't think I would harm you?" He was surprised when she cut him off before he was done with a wave of her hand.

"Ye gave me your vow, did ye no'? "I will never hurt you, nor cause you to be harmed. You are completely safe with me." " She mimicked his words and tone perfectly and startled him. "Ye're no the type to take that back, and hurt a lass who can do ye no hurt in turn."

"Got me all figured out, do you?" He asked with a smile in his voice.

"Of course not. Likely, I ne'er will."

They were quiet, and sitting together in quiet lulled her into an almost-doze, and she jerked up with a harsh gasp when she felt herself sag into complacency. She'd flown half across the room, and stood shaking, her arms wrapped around herself as she shook her head violently once to clear the cobwebs from her hands. Sam realized just how bad it was. It was one thing to

hear it, and to understand, and another entirely to see it happen before you. She was literally terrified of sleeping unchecked with them in

proximity to her.

He moved carefully to her and put his hands on her shoulders. "It's okay." He told her. "You're okay."

She leaned into him, just her forehead and shoulder touching him, and surprised them both.

"If I go and get the cuffs, do you think you could sleep? If you had that security?"

"I think so." She snorted and pulled away from him, scrubbing her hands over her face. "I'm seriously fucked up, aren't I?"

Sam barked out a short laugh."Yep. Probably. But I think that puts you in pretty good company. Dean and I aren't exactly what you call well-adjusted either. And Kevin...well, he's had some time to get used to this whole thing, and I don't think he'll ever forgive us for pulling him into our life." He rubbed her shoulders once, and released her.

"I'll be right back, okay?"

"Sam?" She stopped him as he was about to close the door. "Thanks.''

"Anytime, Den." He smiled around the door, using Dean's nickname for her.

He was back after she'd changed into sweats and rebraided her hair, spreading the blankets they'd given her on the bed. He knocked, then opened the door just as she was smoothing the last wrinkle away.

She didn't say anything as she pulled the blankets back and sat on the bed close to the head board.

"Are you sure?" he asked her before he did anything.

"Aye, I am." She didn't look at him as he took one wrist in his hand and secured it to her bed, and did the same with the other.

"Will ye stay? Just for a moment?" She asked after she slid down, pillowing her head half on the pillow and half on her biceps.

"Sure." He pulled the blanket up over her shoulders and smoothed it. He sat on the floor by the edge of her bed, until he was sure she was asleep, then moved quietly out of the room, leaving the door slightly ajar.

Just as quietly, he came back several hours later with a frozen bottle of water and some aspirin. He set them on the little table at her bedside, unlocked her cuffs and snuck back out, not making a sound.

**Lyrics from: You and Tequila. The Black Velvet Band (High Kings Version).**

**Gaelic Translation: I believe in one God, the Father the Almighty...**

_**Bheatha a Mathiar**_**: Hail, Mother**

**Note: I enclose here a sort of Scottish glossary. I didna ken that I'd be using so much Scottish terminology for Denna, so, I'll explain her Slang.**

_**Ken**_**: Know, or understand. **_**Fash, fashed, fashit**_**: Worried, upset, or disconcerted.**

_**Dinna**_**: Don't. **_**Keek**_**: peeking or spying. **_**Tae**_**: To. **_**Wee**_**: Little. **_**Ye**_**: You. **_**Verra**_**: Very**

**Okay? Good.**


	8. Interlude

Saved By A Song: Interlude

Denna had had a long day. She'd slogged through enough demon blood this morning to drown a Clydesdale, and a few of them had gotten in some lucky licks, enough so to have her limping for a day. She was tired, both physically and mentally, and wanted nothing more than to go back to her hotel room and shower. Again. But, there was a lead on a possible vampire nest nest in the area, and she'd been emailed with a request to meet at the bar. She'd never get why people wanted to meet, face to face, in _public_. They could have just emailed her the address, but the contact had insisted that they meet her at the Romper. This, as she reminded herself every morning, was her job. She didn't have to talk to him, all she had to do was show up, and get the address. She didn't have to like it. She just had to do it.

She trudged into the Romper, a tiny bar in a dingy part of Philadelphia, feeling like she was about to fall asleep on her feet. She sat on an empty bar stool, and signaled the bartender for a drink. He gestured expansively to the rack of bottles, and she pointed to the long brown bottle of Jamesons Irish. See, that kind of conversation she could handle. Easy, clear communication without any need of speach. The entire world should be made up of bartenders, she thought, and all of the problems would go away. Except, of course, the monsters, which were for real, and forever. But then, so was she.

She sat, sipped her smooth Irish (and thank God for whiskey), and waited for her contact.

_Good evening, Castiel, _she sent up to her brother, as was her wont to do when she had a quiet moment to herself. It made her feel like she was making a phone call to family far away. It made her feel like she was in a family.

_I'm sitting in a rather smelly bar, called the Romper. Some human asked me to meet him here about a vampire nest. I don't want to be here. I don't want to be around people. I don't feel like this is safe. But a job is a job, right?_

She sighed. Where was the human?

She wondered then, when she'd stopped thinking of herself as human.

A small, skinny college boy squeaked up to her in a grimy track suit and a particularly disgusting smile.

"You the vamp hunter?" He asked her, and his grin grew wider at her answering nod. He looked her up and down with greasy eyes. "Pretty hot. I imagined more leather. So, uh, how do you wanna do this?"

She raised a questioning eyebrow at him, then turned away to write on a piece of paper, _I want you to give me the address for the vampire._ She gave it to him with an exaggerated movement and raised eyebrows.

"Look babe, I did. This address. Now, uh, let's get it on. C'mon. Hunt me."

She took the paper back to write on it. _You mean to tell me that __**you**__ are a vampire. And you want me to hunt you._

"W'll, not really. Not in real life. Hey, you contacted me about this role-playing thing. Come on. Let do this."

He was not a vampire. He didn't have information. He was just a pervert. And damnit straight to Crowley, she DID NOT have time for this nonsense.

She wrote one word, and turned away from the boy. _Leave_.

"Hey, bitch, don't you treat me like that!"

A big, meaty hand clamped down on Track Suit's shoulder and spun him around. A biker dressed in leather everything was attached to the hand and he growled at the little pervert.

"Lady doesn't look like she want's your attention, bub. Move on along." The biker shoved Track Suit bodily away from him and the kid was passed along by the others in his company until he was hurled out the door to shouts of laughter. She smirked a little at his squeals of indignation and drained the last of her whiskey.

A hand touched her shoulder with an accompanying "You okay, hon?" She flinched at the touch, and turned to nod her affirmative, but then, she saw his face. Did he have black eyes? Did he not? His face swam, first a mundane biker face, next the face of the man in the warehouse. Back and forth, what was real? She couldn't take the chance. She stumbled off the stool and just as she yanked her knife, strong slender hands clasped her arms to her sides and folded over her chest. Suddenly, she wasn't in the bar anymore. Or maybe she was. But it looked like her hotel room. She was wasn't sure. She snapped her arms out of the lock, whirled and blindly stabbed at whatever was behind her. She stumbled backwards, trying to get as far away as possible. Nothing followed her. Nothing attacked her. Everything was still.

"Denna." Calm voice. Familiar voice, harsh and gentle, like gravel and velvet. Castiel?

She calmed herself as best she could to make her vision stop swimming and settle on one location and looked. She saw him, trenchcoat, suit, askew little blue tie, same as he'd been ever since he'd gotten a permanent vessel. With one new accessory-her black-painted throwing dagger sprouting from his immaculate white shirt. She screamed and rushed toward him, but he grabbed her arm when she reached him. "Denna. I'm fine. You can't hurt me. Look." Easily, he slipped the clean black blade from his chest as easily as if it were a pocket. "Look, little sister. I'm fine." He handed her the blade and she flung it across the room to clatter somewhere. She threw her arms around him and sobbed into that brown trenchcoat. He held her, and let her. Eventually, she realized what she was doing, and backed away from him.

"_Mea culpa, mea culpa, maxima culpa," _she sang. My fault, my fault, my most grevious fault. It was part of the Catholic Mass, an apology to him.

"It's fine, Denna. You're my sister. I am given to understand that family offers comfort in time of distress."

She shook her head. Well, really, her entire body was shaking, but her head shook on purpose. She back away, as far away from Castiel as she could. She sank down against the wall and sat curled in a ball, just shaking.

Cas stepped slowly over to her and sat a little ways away from her.

"I'll be right here until you can talk, or want to. I'll always be here for you, Denna. Whenever you need me."


End file.
